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Without Sin 


A Novel 


By 


Martin ). Pritchard 

y 








New York 

William Heinemann 





Copyright, 1896 

By 

WILLIAM HEINEMANN 


A// rights 7-eserved 




Pkintki) in tup: Uniteo States of America 


c 


WITHOUT SIN 


CHAPTER I 

It was the moment of dawn, and London for a brief space 
lay empty and silent beneath an opalescent sky. Out in 
the Green Park the ruffled birds, roused from their brief 
summer night’s sleep, stretched their wings and preened 
themselves in the warm flood of pink light that filtered 
through the broad leafage of the plane trees. But in the 
streets off Piccadilly, narrow and hemmed with tall houses, 
the pale dusk still lingered. 

A shower had fallen about midnight, and the gas-lamps 
were mirrored in the wet pavement as the man whose duty 
it was to extinguish them passed down Bond Street towards 
Piccadilly. He walked mainly in the road, crossing from 
side to side as he came upon each lamp. The damp ground 
deadened the ring of his footsteps, till they scarcely struck 
an echo from the sleepy houses. 

When he reached the last lamp and turned into Picca- 
dilly, Bond Street ky grey and dead and empty. A few 
of the upper windows presently caught the growing light, 
and stared with a startling blankness at the. shadowy out- 
line of a policeman who lounged within a deep doorway, 
and at a cat which, with lowered tail and stealthy tread, 
was slinking homewards. 

Halfway down Old Bond Street, the heavy iron shutters, 
painted a light starch blue, of Ephraim Levinge’s Art Gal- 
leries, made a clear and bright patch in the morning’ s dusk, 


2 


WITHOUT SIN 


but the gold lettering which crossed the shop front was still 
blurred and indistinct. Behind the shutters, in that por- 
tion of the shop which was reached directly from the street, 
some tall carved cabinets filled with china, and a colossal 
pair of marble figures were enshrouded in grey gloom, but 
beyond, in the great gallery, the glass roof of which was 
shadowed by no high buildings, the day grew quickly and 
lustily, until the two small gas-jets which burnt ail night 
for safety’s sake flickered and faded like dying candles. 

Here within the four walls, papered in a soft, rich shade 
of crimson flock, were collected the fruits of a hundred la- 
bouring minds, the works of a thousand toiling hands, the 
world’s art of five hundred years. Tapestries stitched by 
the slim fingers of royal dames and damosels, whose lords 
and lovers were fighting for their faith’s sake in far Pales- 
tine, made misty backgrounds for delicate cabinets of Ver- 
nis Martin microscopically clear. Tulip-wood commodes, 
overlaid with fine marqueterie and mounted with chased 
or-molu, bulged among slender Sheraton chef-d^ oeuvres and 
the mannered simplicity of Empire escritoires. The Dubar- 
ry’s toilet-table and mirror reflected the coarse features of 
a pictured Marat. Limoges enamels and Cosway’s minia- 
tured beauties filled the ebony recesses of an old Italian 
cabinet which gleamed with the scarlet and amber of clear 
cornelians and the milky whiteness of rare onyxes. The 
tortured limbs of an ivory Chilst, torn in war-time from 
the shrine of some peasant’s church among the southern 
vineyards and yellowed with the passing of centuries, sepa- 
rated the round eyes and bare bosom of a Dutch beauty as 
painted by Jan Van Eyck from a corner of farmyard life 
in Morland’s best style. 

Beneath the glass tops of the show -tables, jewelled 
watches and daggers, rings and rare scraps of the old Vene- 
tian goldsmith’s work, sparkled amid the filmy web of laces 


WITHOUT SIN 


3 


which still savoured of the incense that had smoked about 
the altars of Spain, or had decked the feast-day robes of 
some waxen-faced saint. 

Beneath the apex of the clear glass roof gleamed the cold 
perfections of half a score of statues, the crude whiteness 
of their limbs heightened by the brilliant hues of many tall 
vases which had once blazed in the Imperial apartments of 
the Pekin Palace. 

Bare crackle and priceless blue, jewelled Sevres and flore- 
ated Dresden shone from behind the glazed doors of the rose- 
wood cabinets on which Chippendale himself had worked. 
The cabinets stood either side of the fireplace, the polished 
steel grate of which, together with a plain mahogany writ- 
ing-table placed at right angles, looked startlingly modern 
and utilitarian among the vanities and glories of dead ages. 

A sun-ray, flung back in cold reflection from an upper 
window, struck down through the glass roof. It glowed 
redly on a faded strip of arras, hanging from a brass rod 
across a small door which gave access to the rooms above 
the shop. 

Suddenly through the stillness of the dead past came the 
soft footsteps of a living present, and the sound of a care- 
fully drawn bolt only by a second preceded the stirring of 
the blurred figures on the worn arras into a quivering life. 
A hand, tiny and white and dimpled as that of a marble 
Amorini, pushed aside the heavy folds, and into the midst 
of the art of the world, among the treasures of gone kings 
and queens, the relics of the ravishing fripperies of famous 
light-o’-loves, glided a girl -child. 

She was little for her ten years, with the slender limbs 
and narrow, arched feet tr idition claims for long lineage 
and blue blood. In colouring she was fair, and for a child 
a thought too pale, but the fresli ripeness of her bow-shaped 
mouth dispelled the idea of ill-health. Her hair, which 


4 


WITHOUT SIN 


rolled in heavy tangled curls below her waist, was of a very 
light gold where it llulfed in loose disorder about her face, 
and it only suggested a fuller tint of red in the shadows of 
the mass. Her forehead was white and round, and crossed 
by thin, slightly arched brows of the suggested pale-red 
tint. The nose was perfect, small, and straight, and but 
slightly widened where the thin, sensitive nostrils melted 
into the smooth curves of the cheeks. The chin was short 
and round, and creased with one slight dimple, but it was 
too small for strength, thereby belying the clear-cut and 
firm lines of the mouth. 

So far the features were those of a singularly pretty 
child, a little too pensive, and formed perhaps for ideal 
youth, but possessing, despite that, a quaint charm. Yet 
it was the eyes, with ali their defects of colour and shape, 
which made at once the peculiarity and fascination of the 
face. They were set rather far apart, and were of a de- 
cided almond shape, the effect of which was enhanced by 
the thick white eyelids, which seemed depressed by the 
singular fulness below the arch of the brow. In colour 
they were rather a light grey, saved from shallowness, cold- 
ness, and insincerity, by the intense blackness of the fine 
lashes. They had an unfathomable depth, a vague sugges- 
tion of mysterious introspection, an expression that was so 
absolutely unmundane, that they lent to the child’s whole 
personality an atmosphere of etherealism. 

She was clad in a frock of pink cotton, which, as she had 
dressed herself, remained frankly unbuttoned at the back 
where her small fingers could not reach. Nothing daunted 
by the strange effect of the new morning light on the oddly 
mingled contents of the Art Gallery, the little girl dropped 
the arras behind her and advanced. With light, leisurely 
steps she threaded her way among the polished inlaid tables 
burdened with rare porcelain and the huge Oriental vases 


WITHOUT SIN 


5 


which would have crushed her had they fallen. Now and 
then she paused in her passage to lay her warm baby hands 
on the satin of a chair or the heavy bosses of a carven chest. 

“I’ve come to say good-bye, I’ve come to say good-bye,” 
she murmured, as though she desired k) justify herself in 
the nursery crime of breaking the bounds of the upper part 
of the house, by stealing downstairs to the forbidden ground 
of the “ Big Boom,” as she had called the gallery ever since 
she could remember. AVith a childish sense of fairness she 
noticed each object in her path, until she came to the east- 
ern end of the gallery where the deep bay of the ceiling 
still cast a blue shadow. 

Into the dimmest corner she crept with infinite care, 
wedging her slender body between a heavy gilt chair and 
a high carved pedestal of ebony and ivory. 

“ I’ve come to say good-bye.” 

A faint note of regret threaded her childish treble, and a 
pucker of pain drew her brows together. 

She stood before a small picture of the Madonna, painted 
on a panel in the style of the early Italian school. From a 
background of transparent cobalt, the fair face of the Vir- 
gin shone like a jewel, transcendently holy, humanly piti- 
ful. From beneath the gauze drapery which veiled the hair 
of palest corn-colour, the tender eyes, half-hidden by the 
lowered white eyelids, gazed with divine benignity at the 
child. As the day grew to fuller glory, the thin thread of 
gold above the saint’s head, and the great graven clasp 
which held a royal cloak of worked green velvet across an 
underdress of pink, shone brightly, and in the quiver of 
the reflected light, the silent sad mouth seemed to the child 
to smile. In response she crept closer to the picture, and 
laid her lips against the glass which covered the panel. 

“I’m going away to-day to school, and I am not coming 
back till I am quite a big girl. But I shall never forget 


6 


WITHOUT SIN 


you, for grandfather says I am like you, so does Martin. 
Oh, I hope 1 am! I would like to be.” 

With one dimpled finger she traced the outline of the 
pictured face, then passed her hand about her own cheeks, 
whispering, as she did so; 

“ Martin always says that you were good, the goodest 
woman that ever lived. If I look like you, perhaps I shall 
be as good as you — one day — when I am grown up.” 

Presently, with the natural unrest of a child, she slipped 
from her cramped place and continued her wanderings. On 
a shelf near by stood a tiny Dresden shepherdess. It was 
to be hers one day if she were a good girl, and she looked 
at it now with a smile of prospective possession. On the 
ground beneath the shelf was a heap of stuffs : old brocades 
smelling of camphor chests, embroidered muslins faintly 
sweet of dead roses, and strips of finely drawn lawn, the 
work of patient German fingers. 

The little girl dragged the scented pile into the light, 
which now flooded the gallery in a golden haze of sunshine 
from end to end. Her tiny hands turned over and sorted 
the stuffs, while her budding femininity saw a use for the 
smallest scraps. How sweet her best doll, Mabella, would 
look in this bit of scarlet and gold, and if only her grand- 
father would give her that piece of blue brocade, Martin could 
re-cover the drawing-room furniture in her dolPs house. 

“I wonder if he will give it me,” she said to herself. 
“ He cannot want a tiny bit like that. I must beg — I must 
coax.” She raised her eyes, already in imaginary supplica- 
tion. They fell upon the picture in the corner. The pure 
sweet face, to the child’s imagination, always responsive to 
every emotion, was sad, and seemed to express reproof. 
As though caught in an act of naughtiness, she flushed scar- 
let. “I forgot you,” she said; “I am sorry.” 

With her innocent heart filled with a desire for forgive- 


WITHOUT SIN 


7 


ness, and unable to plead her cause in words, she gravely 
and ill perfect faith smoothed out a strip of the cobwebby 
lawn and placed it scarf-wise on her head. That done, she 
pulled a stiff piece of worked brocade about her shoulders, 
and, trailing the rustling folds behind her, stepped towards 
the sacred picture. 

“ Tell me how to be good, ” she pleaded, as she scrambled 
up into the gilt chair, from between the bowed arms of 
which the Pompadour had ruled France. Curled in the 
satiny depths the child lay quiet and still, till from very 
inaction and the hothouse warmth of the gallery the heavy 
lids drooped, the baby lips parted, and the little maid slept. 

Outside, in the sunny streets, the first low roar of awak- 
ened London throbbed skywards. The lumber of waggons 
was punctuated by the shrill jingle of milk carts, and the 
buoyant rattle of light, home-going hansoms. The first 
’buses, laden with heavy -eyed work-girls and sallow young 
clerks, snatching a brief smoke before business hours, and 
reading flimsy halfpenny papers, rolled down Bond Street. 
A sudden crop of dust-pails sprang mushroom-like from the 
kerbstones, and the opening shops gave up a stuffy, close 
odour to the fresh summer air. 

The postman walked briskly down the street, nodding 

good-morning” to the servants and cleaners at the shop 
doors. As he neared the pale-blue, blank front of Ephraim 
Levinge’s art gallery, a small door in the iron shutter was 
opened from within, and a touzled-headed youth in rather 
dirty shirt-sleeves and a green baize apron stepped yawning 
into the brilliant sunlight. 

“Oh! lor,” he cried, as the postman came within ear- 
shot, “you don’t mean to tell me as it’s eight o’clock?” 

“ Seven minutes past, young man ; I began at the end of 
the street on the stroke of the hour,” said the postman 
sharply. 


8 


WITHOUT SIN 


With a smothered groan, the boy clutched the proffered 
bundle of correspondence and then dived into the twilight 
of the shop, from whence, in another moment, issued the 
creaking of an ill-oiled winch, as he began to slowly wind 
up the revolving shutter. 

The flood of garish light which poured in from the street 
roused the dreaming child. She slid from her silken throne 
and stood in all the quaintness of her gorgeous draperies 
before her beloved picture. 

‘‘Good-bye! good-bye!” she whispered, her upturned 
mouth momentarily misting the clearness of the glass over 
the panel. 

“I’ve caught you. Miss Mary, have I? A nice fright 
you give me when I found your bed empty. Oh! you 
naughty girl!” And the frightened maid shook the child 
until the clear lawn scarf slipped sideways over her curls 
and the single button of her frock gave way. 

“ Bessie ! What has Miss Mary been doing? Mr. Levinge 
would be very angry if he saw you shake her like that.” 

The voice came from the outer shop, where, outlined 
black against the dazzling sunshine, a man stood. So in- 
tense was the contrast between the dim light of indoors and 
the white glare of the street that it was impossible to see 
his face. But one glance at the silhouetted form showed 
him to be tall and spare, with sloping shoulders slightly bent, 
and a long narrow head craning forward from between them. 

The little girl sprang forward as he spoke. 

“Oh! Martin, I am not naughty, indeed I’m not; I only 
came to say good-bye to Our Lady.” 

“ And what time did you set about doing it, I should like 
to know, miss?” snapped the servant, whose wrath against 
her charge did not dare to do more than smoulder in the 
presence of Mr. Baird, the business manager and right hand 
to Ephraim Levinge. 


WITHOUT SIN 


0 


“ I came down before the birds began to sing, ” answered 
the child directly. 

“Then p’raps you’ll just come upstairs and be decently 
dressed,” said Bessie, stripping little Mary’s royal brocade 
and transparent veil from her and tossing them on a chair 
with all a true-born Philistine’s contempt for old “rags.” 

“I’ll come, Bessie,” replied the child gently. “You’ll 
see me off, won’t you, Martin?” she added, putting out her 
little hand to the silent figure before her. “ I go away to 
school to-day.” 

“ I shall see you before you start, certainly,” replied Mar- 
tin Baird, turning towards the ample writing-table in the 
front shop at which the intricate accounts of Ephraim Le- 
vinge’s vast business were kept. As he took off his hat, 
which was of silk and scrupulously glossy, though scarcely 
of the latest fashion, and turned to hang it on its usual peg 
above the iron safe, the light fell full upon his face. 

Martin Baird was a Scotchman, and showed his national- 
ity in every line of the high forehead, from which already 
the grizzled hair was in rapid retreat; in the deep-set, small, 
grey eyes, the close-shaven long upper-lip, which shut like 
a trap upon the softer lines of its fellow, and in the broad 
rugged jaw and square chin. He was but forty -five, but 
early sorrows and a certain grim defiance of fate had written 
another decade across his brow. 

Those who had bus'ness transactions with him said they 
had sooner far traffic with old Levinge himself, for there 
was always a faint chance of a good deal with the Jew, but 
with the Scotchman never. 

Men and women were nothing to him. Neither the mil- 
lionaires who clattered up to his employer’s door in all the 
pomp and circumstance of Barker-built broughams and 
matched blood horses, nor the fair women who left the per- 
fume of their silken skirts and the ring of their light laughter 


10 


WITHOUT SIN 


behind them. Neither for those who came to sell or to 
buy, nor Jew nor Gentile; neither the honest soul who had 
come to misfortune’s direst straits, nor the acknowledged 
“fence.” For they were but atoms in that gigantic social 
system which had left his mother to die a drab’ s death in a 
ditch, and had chained him through his childhood, youth, 
and the best days of his man’s estate to the worst horrors 
of beggary and starvation. 

But for his employer, who had picked him out of the ig- 
nominy of an old-clothes store in the New Cut — the shrewd 
old Jew who had scented acumen beneath his rags and had 
read honesty in his hungry, sunken face, who had trained 
his broad bony hands to tell a piece of yate tendre in the 
dark, and his keen, small eyes to settle the painter of a 
doubtful picture at a glance, for the man who had fed and 
clothed and saved him from worse than death, for his master 
and his friend, Baird would have died to express sufficient 
gratitude and devotion. And the little child? She with 
floss-gold, hair, that only glowed with richer tints in the 
shades of its meshes; she with the eyes that saw beyond 
the edges of the world; she with the plaintive bow-shaped 
mouth that seemed meet for the kisses of Sorrow? All the 
crushed affection and despised sentiment of the man’s love- 
less life revived and fed on the fair innocence, the flower- 
like purity of Ephraim Levinge’s grand-daughter, Mary. 
From the first hour, when from amid the wealth of conti- 
nents she had toddled to greet him, an outcast and a starve- 
ling, the reverence which lies in the hearts of all men for 
the pure and spotless had gathered in a halo of worship 
about the tiny creature. 

Martin Baird was not a religious man. The grand belief 
of a blind faith which accepts the axiom “ whatever is, is 
right” has been killed within him by a cruel boyhood, and a 
youth spent in the sordid struggle for mere existence. The 


WITHOUT SIN 


11 


desperate animalism of the body had ousted the faith of the 
soul. But when the child’s faltering footsteps grew firmer, 
the baby lisp more distinct, and the precociously forming 
face and colouring of the little girl repeated in flesh the 
vague outlines of a dingy little panel picture of the Madonna 
which hung in a dark corner of the shop, vague stories and 
forgotten lessons stirred in Baird’s heart. The seeds of a 
dead faith quickened into life, and fostered by the mysticism 
of a restrained Northern temperament, grew to a strange 
idea, half chimerical, half real, yet wholly fantastic. 

For three years he had justified the art dealer’s faith in 
him, and had so assisted the old Jew in his business that 
the building of the great gallery at the back of the shop 
became a necessity. Then Baird gave his quaint fancy 
reins, and he boldly hung the unnamed picture, now re- 
stored and set in a frame of old Italian carving, among the 
works by the masters of the world. 

“ What’s that rubbish doing here?” had cried Levinge in 
his gutteral English. “ I won’t have that in my fine new 
gallery. Everything here is signed and authentic. Turn 
it out! Turn it out, I say, at once!” 

“I shouldn’t do that, if I were you, Mr. Levinge,” had 
answered Baird in his deliberately thoughtful fashion. 
“ It’s true there is not a mark to show who painted the pic- 
ture. But you can see it’s of the grand Umbrian school — 
the greatest school of Italy. The painting is exquisite — 
and now that it is cleaned, it glows like a jewel.” 

‘^Well enough — well enough,” returned the other, peer- 
ing under his heavy grey eyebrows at the work. “ But my 
patrons like pedigree. People who don’t know anything 
about what they are buying, want to feel sure they are not 
being made fools of. That’s why people come to me; I 
always give ’em a good name, and the real article for their 
money.” 


12 


WITHOUT SIN 


“ But you are not obliged to sell that picture, ” said Baird 
very slowly. 

‘‘Not sell that picture,” almost screamed the old man, 
all the Semitic instinct in revolt against the idea of keeping 
something which would not fetch a price. “ What would 
you have me do with it? Give it away?” 

“No, keep it. Why, sir, don’t you see who it is exactly 
like?” 

Ephraim Levinge thrust his gold-rimmed spectacles across 
his large bony nose, and looked long and closely at the 
painting. 

“ It’s exactly like little Miss Mary ; the mouth, the hair, 
even the shape of the brows, which are so high above the 
eyes. I should not part with it, sir.” 

And through the years the beautiful Madonna — “ Mary’s 
picture” — as the family called it, with the tender, meek look, 
scarcely fitting the royal raiment clasped about her, hung 
like a luminous gem in Ephraim Levinge’ s Art Gallery. 

And in the twilight of the summer evenings when busi- 
ness hours were over, and the pale-blue iron curtain shut out 
Bond Street and the world, Mary would creep downstairs 
as lightly as a spirit child, to Martin Baird, who would take 
the little Jewish maiden on his knee, and weave from slum- 
bering memories stories of the Holy Virgin and of the 
martyred Saints, that being forbidden were sweet with 
mystery and the pleasures of a secret to the child. 

And every night as she reluctantly left her strangely 
chosen friend, and glided away to her little bedroom, she 
would smile up at the picture and whisper : 

“I am glad my name is Mary, and that I look like her.” 


CHAPTER II 


It was a summer’s day in mid-season, five years later. 

The long line of carriages which filled King Street from 
end to end, the crowd of servants which lounged and gos- 
siped round the heavy porch of Christie’s, and the never- 
ending stream of people which flowed through the wide 
swing doors, betokened that one of the great sales of the 
season was going on within. 

The accumulated treasures of Simeon V. Dexter, Esq., 
of New York, Chicago, and London, bankrupt, millionaire, 
and bankrui)t again, had a world-wide reputation, and for 
three days all society, in its prettiest summer frock and glos- 
siest silk hat, had assisted at the sale of the tables at which 
it had dined and supped, the lounges on which it had flirted 
and giggled, and the rare curios which it had envied scarce- 
ly six months ago. And as each lot was put up, a thousand 
piquant reminiscences bubbled from the prettiest lips of 
London. 

To-day the pictures and the china were to be sold, and a 
strong element of art collectors leavened the merely fash- 
ionable throng. By the time Mr. Wood, in severe moi'iiing 
dress, and with his pink face glowing behind his gold-rimmed 
glasses from the heat, had stepped into the rostrum, the 
East Room was nearly full. The green walls, barred across 
with stout strips of wood, were hidden almost from the floor 
to the deep bay of the ceiling by the pictures which hung 
in long lines under the strong top light. 

The narrow cane-seated benches placed by the double line 
of baize-covered tables were filled by the Jew dealers. Im- 


14 


WITHOUT SIN 


maculately dressed, perfectly groomed, and most of them 
wearing flowers in their buttonholes, their full dark eyes 
were everywhere, and their Angers, thick and beringed, 
scratched perpetual notes on the margins of their catalogues. 
The chief characteristic of the dealer permeated every feature 
of their eager faces. There were bargains to be made, com- 
missions to be charged, buying and selling to be done, and 
the biggest swell among them forgot for the moment his 
Saturdays at Hurst Park and Kempton, and his Sundays at 
Maidenhead, to wonder how the prices would run, and 
whether a “ good thing” could be picked up cheap. 

Behind them pressed and surged, in waves of many 
colours, a deep line of women, their light laces and flower- 
trimmed hats catching an extra bloom of freshness by con- 
trast with the black frock coats of the men. Round the 
outer edge of all, ebbed and flowed a tide of society men. 
The dealers at the green tables were better dressed than they 
were, but they lacked the supple length of limb and high- 
bred air of insouciant ease, which characterised these leis- 
ured idlers. 

The sale began, and amid the dull bidding for the first 
dozen pictures, people settled down to attention and by de- 
grees stopped talking. An exquisite landscape by Crome, 
with luminous mellow distances, and the foreground bathed 
in clear sunlight, first roused the rather languid competi- 
tion. Both Birmingham and Manchester wanted the pic- 
ture, and the bidding rose from hundreds to thousands by 
leaps and bounds. As the price rose, the flowery head- 
pieces of the women ceased to oscillate, and the dark eastern 
faces of the dealers grew' eager, and their eyes bright. A 
gasp of belief and wonder followed the tap from the rostrum 
which annonnced a Brummagem victory. Mr. Wood smiled 
inscrutably at his intimates ; the buyers had tasted blood, 
and the day’s sale would be a good one. 


WITHOUT SIN 


15 


While shrewd eyes were glancing at the next lot, there 
was a slight stir near the door, where a small, spare man, 
long past the middle age, was elbowing his way though the 
crowd. He was tightly buttoned in a well-worn frock coat, 
and his collar, which was encircled by a bird’s-eye hand- 
kerchief, scraped his shaven chin. The sallow face and 
high-bridged nose were drawn and immobile, but the eyes 
were a bright, clear hazel and never at rest. Side-whiskers, 
dyed snuff-brown and tightly curled down either cheek, gave 
the last touch of old-world aristocracy to the millionaire 
Duke of Grandchester. 

In his wake was his artistic Jides Achatesy Ephraim Le- 
vinge. The great art dealer’s rusty hat and long greasy 
overcoat, which in cut was very like a gaberdine, set the 
old man as far apart from his curled and scented compatriots, 
as his squat body rolling on short thick legs and his large 
fleshy features proclaimed him of a different race from the 
well-built, clear-skinned Englishmen. Yet three dames of 
high degree waylaid and took counsel of the old man as he 
pushed by them, and the dog’ s-eared pocket-book he carried 
contained more commissions than any half-dozen of the 
other dealers could muster between them. He and the Duke 
soon reached the top of the room, where a seat was quickly 
found for Levinge. “Nine hundred — and twenty — and 
thirty— fifty— seventy -five,” said Mr. Wood as quietly as 
though he were sitting in his own private room. 

A little woman, standing at the other side of the tables, 
with an absurd nose, a mouth of extraordinary dimensions 
and marvellous humour, and a pair of large grey eyes which 
would have redeemed the face of a Gorgon, turned to a lady 
at her side and said in a stage whisper : 

“Heavens! There’s papa, and with Levinge too. I 
should like to know where my next quarter’s allowance will 
come from.” 


16 


WITHOUT SIN 


She spoke with such frankness, that a titter ran through 
the group about her. 

“Don’t speak so loud, Theo,” murmured her companion. 
“ You know the Duke always likes to run in here. I don’t 
suppose he’ll buy much.” 

“Oh! won’t he. I know papa better than you do, re- 
member,” answered the first speaker, shaking her small 
brown head till the sheaf of poppies and cornflowers which 
nodded atop of her hat became positively prismatic in the 
sunlight. “ Why was he in such a hurry to come back from 
Paris, where he always enjoys himself, if it wasn’t to have 
a fling at this sale? I wish I could get at Levinge, I’d 
positively forbid him to bid for papa. ” And with a toss of 
her well-dressed head and a twist of her pretty shoulders, 
the aggrieved dame took to alternately frowning at Ephraim 
Levinge and shaking her head at the Duke of Grandchester. 
“ Four hundred — and five — and ten” intoned the auctioneer. 

“ Who is the ugly woman over there who is making such 
an exhibition of herself; she’s quite too vulgar for any- 
thing. ” 

It was a typical daughter of Judah who spoke in high, 
nasal tones. Tall and thin to attenuation, the large, prom- 
inent bones of her shoulders and hips gave her a square, 
box-like appearance, which was in no way mitigated by the 
extravagantly fashionable inake of her white crepon gown. 
Her skin was thick and sallow. Her hair, of a pale ash 
colour, was dressed in precise curls across her high fore- 
head, and cast no softening shadow above the cold expres- 
sionless eyes of slate blue, and the long, thin nose, which 
was distinguished as far as the tip, where it became fleshy 
and pendulous. The mouth matched the hard eyes and the 
peevish voice. It was thin, bloodless and down-drawn at 
the corners, the mouth of a woman who is either a sufferer 
or a shrew. 


WITHOUT SIN 


17 


The young man to whom she spoke turned towards her a 
pink, clean-shaven countenance, the natural vacuousness of 
which was momentarily relieved by an expression of intense 
alarm. 

“ Dear Mrs. Mossenthal, what are you saying? That^s 
Lady Theo Ballestier, quite a ‘smartic,’ and next you — for 
goodness sake don’t turn round just now — is her aunt, 
Sybilla, Countess of Windover.” A gentle tap from the 
ivory hammer announced a sale. 

^‘Mr. Treuberg, Frankfort,” murmured Mr. Wood, not- 
ing down the address of the buyer. 

Mrs. Mossenthal never flushed, her skin was too thick, 
but as Mr. Chant spoke she tightened her lips into an 
ominously thick line and glared ostentatiously, to convey 
the impression that the derogatory remark had emanated 
from some one in her vicinity. 

Bidding now became brisk. Mr. Wood’s keen eyes 
glanced from side to side, catching the slightest nods and 
movements of the well-known buyers. The heat became 
intense, and only the crackle of waving fans rose from the 
weary crowd. The dust hung in a golden haze under the 
skylight and mingled flatly with the rising odour of a hun- 
dred perfumes. The blue roses and red poppies which 
flourished from every feminine coiffure flashed indefinite 
rainbow combinations; the real blossoms in the men’s coats 
grew faint and brown. 

As the afternoon grew older and the gems of the collec- 
tion fell before the inexorable hammer, many of the onlookers 
forced their way towards the door. The cooler air blowing 
up the wide stairs from the street and the dimmer light of 
the vestibule were delicious after the stifling atmosphere of 
the sale-room. 

“Ouf !” said Lady Theo Bellastier, taking a huge breath 
of fresh air and shaking out her skirts as she emerged from 
2 


18 


WITHOUT SIN 


the doorway. “ What a wicked atmosphere. Is it the pic- 
tures or the people who make it so intolerably stuffy? I 
feel positively cooked, and Vm sure for the la»st half-hour 
papa has looked as if he were going off into a fit. However 
do you manage to keep so cool, Adela?’^ She glanced from 
her inferior height to Lady St. Cyprien, a woman more than 
common tall, her stately carriage of both head and shoulders 
rendering her even more imposing. Dark eyes, which could 
flash in anger or melt in tenderness, were set deep beneath 
straight black brows. The nose was rather high and thin. 
The mouth and chin strong as those of a man. Her clear 
olive skin was lightly touched with rouge on the cheeks, but 
neither dye nor powder marred the perfection of her snow- 
white hair, wdiich at the age of fifty-five had transformed 
Lady St. Cyprien from a plain woman into an acknowledged 
beauty. 

She looked down now from her superior inches and 
showing a fine set of white teeth, said : 

You fidget yourself into a fever, Theo. Ah ! here comes 
Mrs. Van der Hoyte.’’ 

A little American, with her sharp face a-beam with smiles 
and diffusing an atmosphere of Worth and Streeter about 
her, minced up to the two ladies. She had only been in 
London three months and was making her way in society 
with very fair success — and boundless expenditure. 

‘‘How d’you do. Lady St. Cyprien?” she twanged as she 
approached. “Sakes! wasn’t it warm in there, and — oh 
my! some of the pictures! If Dexter’s mother could have 
seen them she would have died of shame. What Mr. Van 
der Hoyte will say when he finds I’ve bought that Teniers, 
I don’t know.” 

But Lady Theo Bellastier, having small patience with the 
vulgarity of false modesty, turned away to chatter with a 
very lovely woman, whose misty blue eyes and delicate 


WITHOUT SIN 


19 


flower face gleamed from among the sparkle of diamonds 
and a cloud of perfumed laces. 

“My! does Lady Theo know that woman?” hissed Mrs. 
Van der Hoyte in a loud whisper. “ She was hired girl to 
my mother out in Buffalo ten years ago.” 

“Myra Clyde is teaching me ‘Lu! La! Lay!’ and that 
jolly dance of hers,” said Lady Theo, as the popular star 
nodded her “good-day,” and ran down to her carriage. 
“ I’m getting to do that queer little kick perfectly. You 
shall all see it at the Westlake’s next Sunday.” 

Mrs. Van der Hoyte was f/auche enough to look shocked. 

“ But do you know what Myra Clyde’s position was!” 

“Perfectly,” answered Lady Theo, drawing her slender 
figure up with considerable dignity. “And I also know 
what my position is. Adela, if you want to go up to Le- 
vinge’s about those Chelsea figures, I can drop you. I’m 
going up Bond Street.” 

Her little ladyship gave the American the chilliest of 
bows, and with Lady St. Cyprien was half way down the 
stairs, when a high-pitched, plaintive voice arrested her. 

“ Dearest ladies, for heaven’s sake don’t run away like 
that. How on earth is a poor male thing to know what 
you’ve got on without having even a glimpse of you.” 

The sleek-headed, pink-faced youth, w'ho had been stand- 
ing next Mrs. Mossenthal in the sale-room, came, with much 
waving of his glossy hat and well-gloved hands, down the 
stairs. 

He called himself a society journalist — one of those nebu- 
lous beings who flash and flutter for a few years about the 
skirts of women ; who spring from nowhere, and speedily 
sink into nothingness; who dine and visit in a middle-class 
set, the doings of which they do not care to chronicle, and 
who track down and scribble about people into whose houses 
they would never be admitted, 


20 


WITHOUT SIN 


But Lady Theo was democratic and good-humoured, and 
she cried, with one of her wide smiles : 

“Well, you may have one peep. But you don’t deserve 
it, Mr. Chant, you really don’t,” and she shook a slim 
finger at him. 

Mr. Bertie Chant’s smooth round cheeks turned from 
pink to red, and he shrugged his shoulders deprecat- 
ingly. 

“ The lady with me, you mean?” 

Lady Theo nodded. 

“My dear creature,” he piped, “if ever you know her — 
she’s a Mrs. Mossenthal — you’ll find out she’s a woman 
with an iron will — positively iron, I do assure you. She 
quite ordered me to bring her here to-day, because she had 
heard all you smart folk were coming, and ” 

“ And she gave you a perfect luncheon cooked by that 
chef of hers first. I’ll be bound, and drove you down here 
in her new victoria. You see I know all about her. 
Women don’t go to the same dressmaker for nothing. But 
why can’t you be content to eat her dinners and win her 
money at ‘bac.’ — I hear they play high at her house — 
without being seen in public with her? She’s so shockingly 
tribal.” 

Mr. Chant so far forget his manners as to remind Lady 
Theo that she herself not infrequently dined at Jews’ 
houses. 

“ My dear boy, tu quoque is no argument. Of course I 
dine with the chosen when I choose. Their cooks are gener- 
ally twenty times better than my own, and they don’t mind 
losing their money to one of us, and they always pay up at 
once. But all the same, I shouldn’t think of driving round 
the Park with a woman like that, and speaking to her under 
the noses of my own set. So don’t go and say in one of 
your papers that ‘you noticed Lady Theo Bellastier in pink 


WITHOUT SIN 


21 


chatting to Mrs. Mossenthal in blue,’ because if you do, I’ll 
never speak to you again.” 

“What a queer wonian you are, Theo,” said Lady St. 
Cyprien, as their carriage turned into St. James’s Street. 

“What have I been doing now?” 

“ You don’t mind who sees you talking to that dreadful 
music-hall creature, Myra Clyde, who is quite the most 
notorious woman in town just now, and yet you would not 
have your father see you bowing to a Mrs. Mossenthal. I 
really don’t understand.” 

“Oh, yes, you do, Adela,” said Lady Theo, with a light 
laugh. “ To know a Myra Clyde is merely an eccentricity. 
Such people as she are so entirely apart from one’s life that 
one can pick them up and throw them away again like a 
pair of gloves. Besides, Myra is so awfully amusing. But 
the type of the wealthy Jewess is very different. Her 
money and her social ambition render a her factor with which 
one has to reckon. Mrs. Mossenthal could probably buy me 
up to-morrow, and she knows it; but all the same, she’d 
give her little finger to get me to her house. No, I won’t 
come into Levinge’s, thanks. I always buy such a lot of 
things there, and I’m harder up than ever just now. Be- 
sides, I see Aunt Sybilla’s carriage at the door, and I ex- 
pect she and papa are inside. If they catch me, they’ll 
read me such a jeremiad about Ellis Vyvyan’s poker party 
last Wednesday. It was an awful evening. I lost every- 
thing, and Lady Carstairs was furious because I didn’t pay 
at once, and said she should speak to papa or my husband. 
Ugh! How I hate a spiteful woman. Au revoir.” 


CHAPTEE III 


As Lady St. Cyprien entered the cool dusk of Ephraim 
Levinge’s shop, Martin Baird, in his severely cut frock coat 
and with his grizzled hair brushed in a hard line across his 
forehead, came forward from the large gallery beyond. 

“ Mr. Levinge will be back in a few minutes if you wish 
to see him.^’ 

“Of course Lady St. Cyprien will wait, milady,” said a 
loud masculine voice behind him. “ Come in here, Adela, 
and help me choose Maria Vane a wedding present. Grand- 
chester has got his nose into a bundle of old prints, and is 
no good at all.” 

Sybilla, Countess of Windover, had the voice and gait of 
a man in petticoats, and cultivated, even in the uncompro- 
mising rigidity of her side curls, the extraordinary likeness 
she bore her brother, the Duke of Grandchester. She had 
a strong harsh voice, and affected a blunt speech and brusque 
manner which made her more feared than loved in her own 
circle. 

“Yes!” the Dowager proclaimed in her strident tones, 
as her kinswoman. Lady St. Cyprien, joined her, “I am 
going to give Levinge one more chance, though I vowed I 
would never come near his place again when I found he 
had charged me twenty -fi /e guineas for that beau-pot affair 
I gave the Princess on her last birthday. An absurd price, 
and I told him so.” The old lady, who was the widow of 
three wealthy peers, thumped the floor with her gold-headed 
cane, then raised it and pointed at Baird. 


WITHOUT SIN 


23 


‘‘But IVe been telling Baird that if I give this place 
another trial I must have something that’s cheap. These 
girls and their wedding presents are a perfect nuisance.” 

“Then why give her anything at all, cousin Sybilla?” 
said Lady St. Cyprien in her soft, gentle voice. 

“Bless me!” cried Lady Windover, lowering her stick to 
the ground again and vigorously punctuating her sen- 
tences with the ferruled end. “ Bless me, Adela, how 
dense you are! Maria Vane is marrying twenty-five thou- 
sand a year, the finest place in the Highlands, and a steam 
yacht. I’m going to spend a month with her in Scotland 
next autumn. Ah! here’s Levinge at last. Now, Levinge, 

I want something for a present, but I won’ t pay more than 
ten pounds.” 

Ephraim Levinge shuffied slowly into the gallery, which, 
with its pictures and tapestries, made a warm background 
to the sculptured nymphs and cupids. The exquisite tints 
of the china, the polished inlay, the flower-strewn silks, 
and old-world timepieces looked very pretty in the yellow * 
light filtering through the linen blinds which were drawn 
across the glass roof. Into the little group of English aris- 
tocrats came the Polish Jew, his coarse strong face, in 
which every characteristic feature of his tribe was exag- 
gerated, his short ungainly figure and big-boned hands 
contrasting strangely with the finer lines and gracious bear- 
ing of his customers. He looked sharply at the Countess over 
his gold-rimmed spectacles, and said, in his thick speech : 

“ Good-day, milady. So you’ve come back to me. 
Didn’t Phillips down the street serve you so well? I saw 
your ladyship’s carriage outside his place for an hour last 
Friday.” The Countess of Windover flushed through her 
frankly laid-on rouge. She was angry at being reminded 
of that visit to the rival dealer’s, which had resulted in her 
spending a lot of money on something she did not want. 


24 


WITHOUT SIN 


^‘1 only come back to you, Levinge, because Phillips’s 
prices are worse than yours,” she said bluntly. ‘‘But this 
time I won’t give much. Ten guineas is the limit, Levinge, 
ten guineas. Now, what about that, eh?” and the awful 
stick was thrust into the midst of a priceless service of egg- 
shell china, with a pedigree which proved that the fair Fitz- 
Herbert and the First Gentleman in Europe had sipped 
green tea from the tiny cups in the Brighton Square of old 
Steyne. 

“I don’t think that would suit your ladyship at all,” 
said the old man without flinching. He knew the parsi- 
mony of his customer too well to be even a little anxious 
lest she should so much as crack one of those fragile gew- 
gaws. 

The Duke of Grandchester, having finished with the 
prints, had started on a tour of inspection round the gallery, 
and, as was his wont, pulled up in front of the unsigned 
picture. 

“That’s still here, I see,” he said over his shoulder to 
Baird. 

“ I do not think Mr. Levinge wishes to part with it, your 
Grace.” 

The Duke fixed his sharp hazel eyes on the sweet grave 
face. 

“Well, if ever he wants the room it takes, let me know. 
I’d give a good deal to have it.” 

“What’s that?” cried Lady Windover. “Going to buy 
another picture? Where will you hang it? Chester Castle 
is lined with them from garret to basement.” 

“There’s always room for a gem like this,” said the 
Duke. 

“ Why, who is the thing by?” snapped the old lady. 

“ It is unsigned, milady, ” said Baird. “ But either 
Crivelli or Botticelli.” 


WITHOUT SIN 


25 


“Crivelli! Botticelli! fiddlesticks! The thing looks as 
though it had been painted yesterday,” and she lunged at 
the panel with her cane. 

“ Yesterday was Sunday, milady,” said old Levinge with 
a malicious twinkle in his bleared eyes. 

Sybilla, Countess of Windover, sniffed, and pretending to 
take no notice of her brother’s amusement, passed on. 

“ What a charming little piece, ” said Lady St. Cyprien, 
over the Duke’s shoulder. 

^‘Ah! here is Mr. Mayne; perhaps he can decide the 
artist’s name.” 

A man, square built and of middle height, had joined the 
group, and with hand-shakes and nods betokened his intim- 
acy with each member of it. The first glance betrayed him 
for an artist. The brown hair clustering closely about his 
ears, the flamboyant tie of soft silk run through a cameo 
ring, the ornately carved piece of amber that headed his 
walking-stick, were all patent indications of Eliot Mayne’ s 
profession. The second glance ameliorated the first impres- 
sion. His clothes were of the latest cut and fashion, his 
short beard of strong reddish-brown hair, trimmed to per- 
fection; his hat, gloves, and boots — ever the stumbling- 
blocks of the exponents of art — were immaculate. He had 
rather the air and manner of an amateur, or of a man who 
seeks to cloak some one strong personal characteristic by the 
assumption of another. 

In his world, which as worlds go was sufficiently eclectic, 
he had made both reputation and fortune as a painter of 
biblical and religious subjects. He had a great following, 
and many of his patrons compared him indifferently with 
Perugino and Bellini, much to his own amusement, for he 
was a man of humour and had a certain superficial feeling 
for art. 

Out of his studio he posed for a gentleman, and that de- 


26 


WITHOUT SIN 


spite an uneasy doubt that there were flaws in his armour. 
Women liked him much, men but a little, and his character 
fluctuated according to whether the chat was held in the 
boudoir or smoking-room. He came forward, hat in hand, 
prepared to give his opinion, which he did with a judicious 
admixture of technicalities. 

Lady St. Cyprien’s undisguised smile at last checked his 
flow of words. 

‘‘Thanks so much, Mr. Mayne. It’s very interesting. 
But I am sufficiently Philistine not to care in the least who 
could have painted the picture. I only know the face is the 
highest ideal of innocent saintliness I have ever seen.” 

She raised her tortoiseshell-handled glasses and looked 
long at the picture. “The face is almost too spiritual even 
for the mother of the Christ.” 

The Duke nodded a grave acquiescence. 

“ It is the face of a girl child who is still too young, too 
pure to know that even virginity exists.” Lady St. Cyprien 
sank into a low chair and looked again at the picture. 

“ Grandchester, where could I ever have seen a face like 
that?” 

His Grace shrugged his lean shoulders and smiled 
sardonically. 

“My dear Adela, only in the National Gallery. The 
great Botticelli there is almost identical in feature and 
expression.” 

Lady St. Cyprien shook her head. 

“No, Grandchester, I have seen that face, living, and 
smiling — for such a mouth and eyes could never laugh — 
with red blood flushing the round cheeks, and little sparkles 
of childlike, innocent amusement coming and going in those 
serene eyes.” She puckered her pencilled brows in an effort 
of recollection. “ Where did I see that face? It was but 
a few days ago.” 


WITHOUT SIN 27 

The Duke, with a gallant air which conceded much to the 
fair sex, shook his head. 

“ You have been deceived by a mere outline, a chance 
scheme of colouring, my dear Adela. The women of the 
end of the century are beautiful, no doubt — but saints — ” and 
Lady St. Cyprien being a married woman and a relation, 
the old Duke winked one eye at Eliot Mayne and chuckled. 

^‘Is grandfather back yet, Martin? I want to show him 
— Oh ! I beg your pardon. ” The clear fluty voice of a young 
girl had spoken from the outer shop, and only died in an 
inarticulate murmur at the entrance of the gallery. 

Lady St. Cyprien turned sharply round and found a tall, 
slight figure, that of a half-grown girl of about fifteen, 
standing almost at her elbow. The child wore a simple 
gown of fine white wool, shirred at the throat and wrists 
and falling in straight folds over the budding bosom and 
slender hips almost to the ancles. A flat hat of golden- 
hued Leghorn straw was tilted back from her face and per- 
mitted the sinking sun to fling fierce rays across the flawless 
velvet of her fair skin and the pale yellow locks that curled 
about her long throat. In her hands was clasped a loose 
bunch of wine-coloured roses which half in shy doubt she 
still held out towards her grandfather. 

“Ach! it is you, my child,” said the old man, scarcely 
turning his head. “ Go upstairs, my dear, I am busy.” 

With a simple little curtsey the young girl was about to 
obey, when Lady St. Cyprien dropped her long eye-glasses 
with a sharp clatter and said : 

“ Surely that is little Mary Levinge. Come and shake 
hands, my dear. Why, how you have grown since I last 
saw you, which was just before you went away to school.” 

“ I remember you quite well. You are Lady St. Cyprien.” 
The young girl spoke with directness and modesty, but the 
instinct of self-humiliation which centuries of persecution 


28 


WITHOUT SIN 


have engendered in her race was entirely absent from her 
manner. She held out her hand with charming candour to 
the great lady, who on her part clasped it warmly. 

“Yes, I am Lady St. Cyprien. Ah! Duke, you would 
like to know this young lady. This is the Duke of 
Grandchester, my dear.” 

The old gentleman bowed before the little Jewish maiden 
as though she had been a princess. Then he touched Lady 
St. Cyprien’s arm and whispered: 

“There is your Virgin’s face — the likeness is extraordi- 
nary.” 

“ Of course ; I passed the child in the street the other day. 
Besides, I remember noticing the strange resemblance when 
she was quite a little thing.” 

“ Your ladyship sees how like the child is to the picture?” 

It was old Levinge who spoke. Sybilla, Countess of 
Windover, having bought for her own price an exquisite 
Sevres cup worth twenty-five guineas, was in a charming 
humour and only too ready to praise everything. 

“La! what a lovely child!” she cried in her most mascu- 
line tones; and then added in a loud whisper: “Gracious! 
Adela. What a peculiar likeness. ’Pon my word, I never 
saw anything so remarkable.” 

Vexed as he was that his patrons should lay such empha- 
sis on the strange resemblance which existed between his 
grand-daughter and the imaginary portrait of a woman who 
is less than nothing in the eyes of a good Jew, old Levinge 
could no more resist the temptation of showing off the child’s 
undeniable beauty than he would have stayed himself from 
reciting the attractions of anything in his shop. 

“Take your hat off, Mary, and let the ladies see what 
pretty hair you’ve got.” 

Without a blush of embarrassment Mary removed her 
hat, and lifting her hands, which had the long, slightly 


WITHOUT SIN 


29 


turned-back finger-tips and narrow almond nails Crivelli 
loved to paint, held them finger to finger and palm to 
palm across her breast as did the pictured saint at her 
shoulder. 

“Divine!” murmured Mayne, his brown eyes ablaze with 
undisguised admiration. 

“The picture is a Botticelli,” cried the Duke, with his 
eyes fixed on Mary. “ Your grand-daughter might have sat 
to him.” 

“ Yet Botticelli never painted it, your grace. Everything 
goes to prove that the picture is a mystery.” 

“And the likeness wonderful,” said Sybilla, Countess of 
Windover, shutting her gold lorgnette and preparing to go. 
“ Grandchester, Adela, are you coming? Good-bye, Mr. 
Mayne.” 

A moment later the gallery was empty save for the child, 
with her long eyes narrowed beneath her drooping lids, her 
plaintive hands and her mouth full and dewy as that of an 
infant, yet sad and set as that of a woman, stood there, a 
pale wraith in the gathering summer twilight. 

The return of her grandfather and the switching on of the 
electric light roused her from her dream. The old man drew 
a greasy black skull-cap from his pocket and putting it on 
began to mumble in Hebrew his evening prayers, now and 
then pausing in his devotions to fling curt instructions to 
Martin Baird, who, with the door of the safe yawning wide 
behind him, was making up the day’s accounts. 

“Mary, go upstairs and tell your aunt I am coming up,” 
Ephraim said presently. 

Mary picked up her hat and her roses, then crossed to 
where the grey -haired manager sat before a pile of books. 

“Good-night, Martin,” she said. “Would you like a 
rose?” She stooped to lay one on his desk. “Martin,” 
she whispered, “did you hear what Lady St. Cyprieii and 


30 


WITHOUT SIN 


the others said about me? It must be true if strangers notice 
it. Good-night.’^ 

With a nod and one of her vague smiles she flitted across 
the gallery and disappeared through the door behind the 
arras. 


CHAPTER IV 


The rooms above the art shop, where Ephraim Levinge 
lived with his widowed daughter Judith Marx and his 
grand-daughter Mary Levinge, were small, and extraordi- 
narily suggestive of the business carried on downstairs. 
The sitting-room, which was on the first floor and looked 
on to Bond Street, and old Ephraim’s bed-room behind it, 
seemed as though they had been caught in periodical high 
tide of ohjets d'^artSy which on receding into their proper 
channels had left behind them, while sweeping away 
familiar friends, sundry relics of the overflow. 

As far back in her fifteen years of life as Mary could 
remember, the rather shabby furniture of her home had a 
queer trick of being supplemented and overwhelmed by fine 
silken-coloured chairs and polished tables she scarcely dared 
to touch. The Japanese bronzes on the mantelpiece would 
be transformed in a single night into huge Worcester vases 
of royal blue, besprent with roses and peacocks. Some- 
times Aunt Judith would loll at her ease in her dirty plush 
tea-gown on a grand French chair with gilt arms, and a 
week later would be forced to seek repose on a narrow- 
seated, straight-backed empire sofa. 

At first the child, with the “ homing” instinct which all 
young animals possess, was troubled by the perpetual 
alteration in her surroundings, and though the bedroom 
she shared with her aunt was seldom if ever molested, it 
frightened and troubled her to see the familiar landmarks 
of her baby days forever changing. 


32 


WITHOUT SIN 


She was five before she connected the visits of her grand- 
father’s friends with the sacrificing of her own household 
gods. 

‘‘Now that’s a nice couch, a very nice couch,” had said 
a burly son of the priestly tribe of Cohen one day, when 
calling on Ephraim Levinge. 

“Yes, it’s a good sound thing that — rosewood, stuffed 
with the best hair you ever saw — and the brocade! Well, 
just feel it.” 

This Mr. Cohen proceeded to do, and then to the child’s 
astonishment opened a long and keenly fought argument 
touching the price. At the end of a quarter of an hour 
both men wiped their foreheads. 

“ I send the money and a cart to-night, ” said Mr. Cohen. 

“But you mustn’t send that away,” had cried the child, 
springing from the floor and dropping her toys. “ That’s 
Aunt Judith’s favourite sofa.” 

The two Jews laughed — but by next morning the sofa 
had gone, and Aunt Judith was reduced for some time 
afterwards to a fifteenth century oak settle. 

From that day Mary discovered that everything had a 
price. Modern or antique, whole or broken, there was 
nothing which was not to be bought — and sold. Thor- 
oughbred Semite as she was, born of a long line of Polish 
hucksters, who had chaffered and bargained in every town 
of central Europe, her nature was streaked with a peculiar 
distaste for the taint of the mart. She had an innate 
reverence for the things of dead great men and forgotten 
lovely women. Her temperament was of too highly 
organised and neurotic a type, her imagination too much 
thrown back on itself by lack of sympathy and companion- 
ship, not to seek their favourite food amid the thousand 
objects of value and interest around her. Where a 
healthier-minded child would have found infinite joy in 


WITHOUT SIN 


33 


dismembering a box of toys, little Mary Levinge would curl 
up oil the floor at the foot of a great bureau or ample chair, 
and would weave a thousand vague romances about the man 
or woman who might have owned it. With the acquisitive 
faculty of her race, she very quickly picked up the essential 
points of periods, and marks of furniture, pictures and china. 

Knowing little of her own great faith beyond the merest 
outward forms, her receptive brain had absorbed to the full 
the strange jumble of the world’s legends, which she had 
gathered either from the lips of Martin Baird — himself a 
man of dreams — or from the vastly indiscriminate reading 
with which he had supplied her. Perhaps with a vague 
idea of some day converting her to Christianity, he had 
taught her to read out of the two Testaments; an exercise 
which, being strictly forbidden, the child intuitively loved, 
even as she grew to cherish the wonderful story of that 
pure woman, whose name was unmentionable in Levinge’ s 
house, beyond the threshold of the Art Gallery, where 
Holy Virgins were relegated to the merely commercial level 
along with Lancret’s Frenchified madames and Lely’s loose- 
vestured and lax-moraled beauties. Always with a view 
of amusing the lonely little girl, Baird had told her a 
thousand times the old Norse and German legends; the 
gipsy stories of Hungary ^ the lives of the saints; the 
glowing tales of the East, till the child evolved her heroes 
and heroines from a confused tangle of yellow-haired sons 
of Odin and ivory-skinned princesses of Italy, of Boman 
maidens martyred at the stake for a new faith’s sake and 
gallant Paladins. 

Mary’s aunt, Mrs. Judith Marx, whose youthful days 
had been passed in hawking cheap jewellery through the 
Ghettos of old German towns, was, in her later years of 
ease and comfort, too utterly given over to a sloth, which 
only partially disappeared at meal-times, to know or care 
3 


34 : 


WITHOUT SIN 


how the little girl was to be educated. So long as Baird 
or a servant would keep the child amused and quiet, Mrs. 
Marx was content. The only offspring of a long-dead 
scapegrace son, the baby Mary had almost been flung into 
the arms of Ephraim Levinge at that moment in his career 
when he was shaking the dust of a nomad life from his 
feet, and settling down as a wood-carver and maker of 
antique oak in a slummy alley off Petticoat Lane. Per- 
haps the frail waif with the sweet, serious eyes, and set 
full mouth that never cried, who had been despised because 
she was born a woman, brought some measure of luck to 
the old man. Life had been bitter with him ; the hands of 
many had been against him, and his hand against all; but 
the Jew is generally good to his own, for the ties of blood 
are with him his single bond with the rest of humanity. 

So Ephraim Levinge, terribly poor as he was in those days, 
was kind in his hard, narrow way to the child, and, as she 
grew older, and his business improved, he was not without 
ambition for her. When she could talk, he moved from 
the squalid nest of his compatriots into more decent quarters 
in North London. He revised to vanishing point Mrs. 
Marx’s list of acquaintances, and forbade that garrulous 
slut to let his grand-daughter run the streets or mix with 
the child-life she would meet there. 

Then came a lucky deal or two. A rage set in for old 
oak, and with a courage which astonished himself, Ephraim 
took a small shop in Bond Street, letting out the upper part 
and still living at Islington. The carved settles and chests 
.soon led to investments in old masters of nebulous origin, 
and little bits of china from the neighbourhood of Frank- 
fort, and by the time Mary was flve, the dark shop had 
blossomed into the “Art Gallery” and “Ephraim Levinge, 
Art Dealer,” was painted in gold above the huge plate-glass 
window, 


WITHOUT SIN 


35 


The marvellous instinct for art which is co-equal in the 
Jew with the capacity for trading, soon taught him to know 
the real thing from the false, and where to place it, and 
when once he had grasped the advantages of honesty, he 
became the acknowledged art dealer of the great world. 
The sale-rooms of London and Paris became familiar with 
his squat, awkward figure and hawk-like face. He trailed 
his frowsy coat and incomprehensible lingo alike through 
royal palaces and the boudoirs of les petites dames, buying 
and selling everywhere. The sums of money he frequently 
risked were enormous, and sometimes frightened this man 
who had begged his way across Europe ; but they always 
came back, the golden sovereigns and the rustling bank- 
notes, bringing more with them. 

His galleries, filled with the masterpieces of centuries, 
became the rendezvous of the fashionable world. Art 
collectors hobnobbed with Levinge; critics consulted 
Levinge; authorities required confirmation from Levinge; 
duchesses gossiped away their mornings with Levinge; and 
their lords considered ways and means with him. 

Wealth fiowed in fast, but the old days, when he had 
tramped pack on back across the Polish snowfields, or 
starved beneath the Italian summer suns, or lain drenched 
through with tropical showers behind a stone wall or hedge 
of vines, had left their traces on his sturdy frame and were 
recalled in the achings of his big bones. And so when the 
day’s business was done, and the heavy iron shutters had 
been lowered over the plate-glass windows, when the cata- 
logues of approaching sales had been marked, and the thick 
green-backed ledgers had been posted up by Baird, 
Ephraim Levinge was glad to go upstairs and wash his 
hands and eat, and then, with his hat on his head and his 
praying shawl about him. mumble a few prayers in his 
corrupt Hebrew before going to bed. 


36 


WITHOUT SIN 


During these years, when her grandfather was scraping 
his fortune together, and teaching the rudiments of art to 
wealthy brewers and globe-trotting Americans, little Mary 
spent those hours which were not passed in Martin Baird^s 
delightful company, with a Scotch servant, who considered 
that in keeping the child quiet she was doing her duty. 
Sometimes, but this very seldom, Mary would be sent to 
spend the afternoon with the children of her grandfather’s 
business friends, but she was too reserved and thoughtful 
to care for their noise and rough play, and after a time tha 
nurseries of Maida Vale and Netting Hill knew her no 
more. 

So the earlier years of her childhood went by, leaving 
her nervous, imaginative, and extraordinarily ignorant of 
everything save a tangle of fanciful tales and a superficial 
knowledge of idly gleaned facts. Wonderful dreams of 
knight-errantry were weaved by the little brain which did 
not know that two and two made four, and the strange 
names and legends of Eastern gods fell from lips that could 
scarcely say the alphabet. 

But when she was ten, by accident Ephraim Levinge dis- 
covered the child’s absolute ignorance. At first it made 
but little impression upon him. Neither his mother nor 
the wife of his early manhood had been able to read, they 
had said their prayers by rote, and it had been good enough 
for them. His widowed daughter, Judith Marx, took 
months to spell through the greasy, dogs’ -eared novels in 
Yiddish, which she surreptitiously borrowed from a small 
Jews’ lending library in Whitechapel. What did the child 
want with learning? Yet through his self -persuasion crept 
the knowledge that since his young days, spent in the 
Ghettos of Poland, a great change had come over his race, 
and especially over the women. The streak of Orientalism 
and the Jew’s inbred contempt for all that is feminine was 


. WITHOUT SIN 


37 


strong within him, and in his daily prayers he always 
thanked the God who had made him a man. Yet he was 
not blind. He had wide eyes and open ears for the 
present, and the instinct of prophecy for the future. 
Woman, the scorned and the inferior, was waking from a 
slumber which had lasted through the ages; why should 
his grand-daughter, the last of his line, the heiress to his 
great business and his ever-growing fortune, sleep on in 
ignorance? 

She must be educated by a proper and responsible gover- 
ness, so Ephraim Levinge announced to Mrs. Marx one 
morning as he quitted the living-room for the shop below. 

Mary was already downstairs, for at the first words deal- 
ing with her own future, her shrinking timidity had urged 
her to fly to the more impersonal company of Martin Baird. 

For a moment, after her father’s heavy tread had died 
on the staircase, Mrs. Marx sat as if transfixed in her 
chair. Then for the first and last time in her life, her slow- 
working brain, fired with ignorant hatred of the enemies of 
her people, the unbelievers in the law, roused her indolent 
body from its normal lethargy, and she went downstairs 
after her father. 

With her black wig askew and her fat, yellow face 
quivering, Mrs. Marx burst into the Art Gallery. 

Levinge was arranging some Chelsea figures in a tall 
cabinet. Baird was sitting at the writing-table rapidly 
answering a large pile of letters; Mary, with her hands 
clasped loosely across her white pinafore, was gazing with 
reverent eyes at the small picture of the Holy Virign. In 
the outer shop, the two assistants were cleaning and put- 
ting together a beautiful girandole of old cut crystal. 

Martin Baird first caught sight of the angry woman. 
Her disturbed manner as well as her appearance in the 
Art Gallery warned him that something was amiss. He 


38 


WITHOUT SIN 


rose quickly and closed the big glass doors which separated 
the shop from the larger show-room. 

His action drew on him the first outpourings of Mrs. 
Marx’s wrath. 

“ Oh, Gentile and eater of unclean things, you had need 
leave my presence. If I were master here I would not 
have your shadow cross my threshold. It is owing to you 
that this last insult has been put upon me and Heaven’s 
lightnings have been called upon this house.” 

She spoke in Jargon which Baird understood well, and 
it was in Jargon— which he seldom now used — that Levin ge 
bade his daughter hold her peace. 

“Peace! Name no peace to me who see myself driven 
from my father’s house,” cried Mrs. Marx turning on 
Ephraim. “ What have I done to thee, 0 my father, that 
thou shouldst force me to leave thy roof? Where have I 
failed in my duty to thee and to the memory of my mother 
— peace be upon him — ? Have I not kept for thee a 
Kosher house? Have I ever failed to light the lamps for 
Shahhos ? Have I not observed the fasts and prepared for 
every feast? Who but I have burnt the leaven at the 
Passover, and cleansed the knives by fire? Is not the 
Borsch I make thee good and the almond pudding light? 
Ah! woe is me!” She flung up her fat hands in a gesture 
of despair. “ You would bring a Goya into this house, 
who would drink milk with the meat and mix the plates.” 

She paused to take breath, and in the interval her father 
turned again to his occupation of arranging his dainty china 
figures. The action was significant of contempt and lashed 
Mrs. Marx to greater fury. 

Her eyes fell upon Mary, who stood shoulder to shoulder 
with her favourite picture, staring at her aunt. The child 
could not speak Yiddish at all, but she understood enough 
to gather that Mrs. Marx’s wrath had been roused by the 


WITHOUT SIN 


39 


prospective advent of a governess — who in all probability 
might be a Christian. 

“Ha! thou foolish one/’ began Mrs. Marx, turning on 
her niece with renewed vigour, “is it not enough that I 
should see thy father’s daughter reading the New Testa- 
ment” — and she spat out with scorn — “that thou shouldst 
not speak the tongue of thy own mother, but only the talk 
of this accursed country, and that thou shouldst worship 
false gods?” 

A pointing finger indicated the sweet face of the Holy 
Virgin and drove home the incomprehensible Jargon to 
Mary’s understanding. 

“ I come not down here much, the Christian and those 
who are reformed make the place unfit, but I know where 
thou spendest thy time. Thou adorest the image of one 
who was a cheat — a mother of lies! Ha! ha!” she snorted 
scornfully, “ those who call her the mother of the Messiah 
are fool-men — she was the mother of lies.” 

“Aunt Judith!” screamed the child, her face grown 
whiter than her frock and her little hands outstretched as 
though to stay the torrent of abuse. . 

Baird sprang to his feet at Mary’s piteous cry, but Mrs. 
Marx, with knuckled hands upon her hips, was revelling in 
the reminiscent abuse of the “Lane” and was not to be 
stayed. 

“ Knowest thou not that the Messiah is not yet? That 
only a true daughter of Judah shall be meet to give him to 
his people as a redeemer and lawgiver? Hast thou no 
knowledge of the prophets who have said, ‘Behold, a 
virgin shall conceive, and shall bear a son, and shall call 
his name Immanuel?’ Look at that face. Thou callest 
that a picture of the Holy Virgin? Pah!” she spat again, 
“she was no better than a wretched drab!” 

“ Silence ! Go to thy own chamber, ” thundered Ephraim 


40 


WITHOUT SIN 


Leviiige, while Mary, white with horror and shaking with 
grief, sank almost fainting into a chair. 

So began and ended Mrs. Marx’s first and last inter- 
ference with her father’s plans for Mary’s future, for 
Ephraim Levinge had not made half a million of money by 
listening to the foolish talk of women. Mary would be 
rich, Mary should be clever enough to keep her riches. 
She should be educated and — the ambition came to the old 
Pole in a flash — she should be a lady. He looked at his 
fat, loose-fleshed daughter. Her flabby, ill-kept skin, her 
dirty finery filled him with a vague disgust, which merged 
in a fierce determination that his little grandchild with 
her golden hair and roseleaf complexion should never 
degenerate into the typical Pullack woman of his people. 

He wondered a little at his new purpose, but he never 
swerved from it. Mary should be taught the ways of 
superlative order, the perfect pride of person, the exquisite 
grace and ease of manner, the low clear charm of speech 
which his natural shrewdness showed him were the hall 
marks of an English lady. 

The handsomest and richest daughter of commerce who 
ever rustled and jingled into his shop was but an over- 
dressed mass of vulgarity beside old Sybilla, Countess of 
VVindover, whose gold-headed walking-cane, stiffly rolled 
side-curls, and shabby black gown had a subtle air of dis- 
tinction which to the Jew was at once indefinable and 
desirable* 

His commercial theory that everything, even the air and 
manners of a grande dame, had a price, and Mrs. Marx’s 
iterated horror of a governess in the house resulted in Mary 
being sent to a first-class school, where her gentleness and 
beauty at once placed her on a level with the sprigs of 
English and foreign Jewish aristocracy who were being 
educated there. 


WITHOUT SIN 


41 


If education and companionship quite failed to cure Mary 
of the habit of indiscriminate day-dreaming, it served in 
some slight measure to regulate and formulate her baby 
ideals, which one by one dropped from her, as premature 
blossoms fall from an undeveloped tree. Yet some re- 
mained with her, and one before all, set to a fruit, and 
grew with her growth till it became a very part of her. 

The religion of the Holy Virgin, that undefiled House of 
Gold, that unbroken Vessel of Honour, that Queen of 
Virgins whose light was the Morning Star, whose ensign 
was a Lily that had led the fiercest war and carried the 
sweetest peace among all nations, was to the little Jewess 
even more than a beloved fairy-tale of the nursery. 

For, despite the fact that the articles of her ancient 
faith, the grand prayers in the sonorous Hebrew tongue, 
and the magnificent ritual of her Church were taught her, 
that forbidden story, that savoured all the sweeter in that 
she might not taste, grew yet more dominant in her, until 
it possessed her like her soul. 

That the Madonna’s Child, born nearly nineteen hundred 
years ago, was that Eedeemer the -prophets of old had 
promised to the Jews, every tenet of her own vaguely 
understood religion forbade her to believe, but that such a 
Eedeemer should arise from among the scattered tribes of 
Israel who should lead them to the Land of Promise, and 
make of the units one grand nation, was with her an estab- 
lished article of sincerest faith. 

Had not even Aunt Judith told her of that humble 
Jewish family, living out their dull peasants’ lives in the 
heart of the dim Hungarian forests, a woman of which the 
faithful Jews of Eastern Europe say will be chosen as a 
meet mother for the expected Saviour? 

Over her lessons, and in the midst of her play in the 
shady school garden where the tall white lilies grew in 


42 


WITHOUT SIN 


silver lines against the old wall, Mary would wonder and 
dream about that poor peasant woman who was to be so blest. 

She saw one day some gipsy girls, swarthy, black-browed 
wenches with tangled ebon locks tumbling into their big 
bold eyes, and thick brass rings set with coloured glass 
dangling from their ears at either side of their bare brown 
throats. The Eomanys whined and begged about the gar- 
den gate, cringing with outstretched dirty claws to the girls 
in their neat school dresses. 

A governess told the girls the women were gipsies who 
had wandered across Europe from beyond the forests of 
Hungary and Bulgaria. Some people believe the gipsies 
are really the two lost tribes of Israel,’’ she told her pupils. 

The memory of the coarse beauty and degraded bearing 
of these outcasts of her own race filled Mary with a vague 
disquietude. All unconsciously she had built her unformed 
faith in a redeemed future round the picture of the pale- 
haired maiden which hung in her grandfather’s Art Gallery 
at home. It was a childish inconsequential thing to have 
done, but it had grown to be a part of her being for so long 
that she could only think that such a woman, with such 
calm brows, such serene meek eyes, and a mouth formed 
for the expression of many sufferings, could alone be hailed 
as ^‘Mother” by the child who was one day coming to 
redeem her people. 

Mary did not voice her beliefs to her teachers. She 
could not have done so, for, with all her brooding, they 
were so intangible, so vague, so essentially prohibited, 
that she could not put them into words even to herself. 
Only when she closed her eyes, as in a cloudy vision, the 
past as she had understood it, the future as she imagined it, 
swept across her brain. In words the child’s ideas would 
have been grotesque; and perhaps it was an undefined fear 
that she would be laughed at, which kept her silent. 


WITHOUT SIN 


43 


For five years she lived her quiet school life, never once 
returning home. Too dreamy to be really clever, said her 
teachers; too delicate to work very hard, said the doctors. 
Then her grandfather had her home again. Ephraim 
Levinge was growing very old; his sturdy peasant frame 
was giving signs that soft lying and good living in later 
years could not wipe out the traces of starvation and 
hedgerow beds ; and he longed with all the softness of his 
hard old heart for the nearer presence of the last of his kin. 
So at the most critical moment of her life, when the soul of 
a young girl first stirs to waking in her still childish body, 
when the heart sickens at a doll and the brain cries out for 
more light, Mary came back to the great Art Gallery and 
the crowded upper rooms, which were so filled with the 
relics of a buried past that there seemed no place for the 
creation of a fair future. 


CHAPTEK V 


The shop and Art Gallery had been shut for over an 
hour, and already the sitting-room upstairs was close with 
the odours of antiquity, drawn from a full suite of oak and 
tapestry furniture by a couple of oil lamps. The glare of 
the lights, scarcely subdued by two cheap ground-glass 
globes, filled the small room, and mercilessly showed up 
the rents in the tapestry, the scratches in the oak, and the 
faded gilding of a broad-faced empire clock which ticked 
solemnly in the corner. 

It was late one Saturday afternoon, the Sabbath was 
over, and Levinge, wearing his shabby tall hat, and with 
his Talith hitched round his shoulders, was seated in a dis- 
tant corner mumbling his prayers. 

Stretched in animal ease on the tapestry sofa was Mrs. 
Marx, her large flabby form draped in the usual untidy tea- 
gown, her black wig profusely greased and tousled into 
stringy curls above her low forehead, and her fat hands 
laden with rings and tipped with dirt. One of her ever- 
lasting cheap Jargon story-books poked a dog^s-eared 
corner from beneath the cushion where she had hastily 
thrust it on her father’s entrance. She only obtained these 
books on such rare occasions as she was able to slip away 
and spend a few hours among her old-time friends at 
Whitechapel, for Judith Marx had the intelligence of a 
child, the instincts of an animal, and was never so happy 
as when she was jabbering her barbarous lingo to a score of 
her compatriots, and eating fried fish or Crepleh, the rich 


WITHOUT SIN 


45 


meat pasties, with her jewelled fingers. Of her old father, 
with his ambitions, his marvellous trading powers, his (to 
her mind) reckless trafficking with Christians, she was 
proud, but very much afraid. She still obeyed him as an 
inferior bows to a higher power, and if she was dirty, 
greedy, and lazy, it was merely because he had ceased to 
correct her on these points. 

Her feelings towards Mary were more complex, if such a 
mass of insipidity can be accredited with either feelings or 
complexity. As regarded her niece’s silent moods, her 
strange flights of fancy and mysticism, and even the more 
solid foundation of her expensive education, Mrs. Marx 
frankly said she could not understand her. She viewed 
with horror the unfettered license of literature which 
Martin Baird engendered in the child, and which Ephraim 
Levinge had never checked. She could never fathom her 
father’s motives with respect to Mary, for her own girlhood 
had been passed in almost Oriental particularity. Yet she 
saw little Mary, on whom she knew the old man doted, 
brought up with an exceptional freedom of speech and 
action. 

Another, who for all his knowledge of Ephraim Levinge’ s 
character and ambitions, could not quite grasp his inten- 
tions with regard to the child’s future, was Martin Baird. 
He not infrequently spent Saturday afternoon and evening 
with the Levinges, sometimes in the over-furnished sitting- 
room, but more often at his desk downstairs, going over the 
green-backed ledgers, marking catalogues, or valuing stock 
with his employer. To-night, however, Ephraim w^as 
expecting a few friends to play cards after the evening 
meal, and the iron safe had been locked for good at four 
o’clock that day. 

The unshaded light was very merciless to Baird. It 
made every white hair on his temples and just above the 


46 


WITHOUT SIN 


ears shine like silver. It insisted upon every wrinkle on 
his pale face, it robbed his secretive lips of the red of life 
and touched them with the bloodless hue of asceticism. 
His toil-worn hands were like wax against the dark plush 
table cover, and in the stillness of the close room, he sat so 
silent and bowed that old Ephraim, as he took off his hat 
and “Four Corners,’’ and peered over the gold frames of 
his spectacles, thought that Martin looked old — very old. 

“ Where is Mary?” he inquired, putting his hat on a 
Boule table. 

“ She is with the Montagus,” said Mrs. Marx in Yiddish. 
“Eose Montagu came with her maid this afternoon, and 
asked if she might go to Portland Place. Her father and 
mother will bring her home this evening.” 

Mrs. Marx arranged and slopped our her words in the 
same untidy fashion as she put on her clothes. Her thick 
tongue and guttural enunciation became more pronounced 
when she spoke English, which she hated having to do, 
but which, since his grand-daughter had returned from 
school, old Levinge had instituted as the home language. 

Ephraim Levinge evolved the meaning of Judith’s vague 
speech, and nodded his head. He was sparing of words, 
for he knew the value — and the cost— of an indiscreet 
phrase, but he allowed a gratified smile to wrinkle his 
mouth. 

He was pleased that the Montagus should have taken 
notice of the child. Benjamin Montagu was the wire-puller 
of the money-lending business. Every man— and many 
women too — of the English aristocracy had climbed the 
stairs to Ben Montagu’s little office in Pall Mall. He held 
the fate of a hundred great families in his podgy white 
hands, he could drag princes from their pedestals if he 
chose, and mar more marriages than ever are made in a 
season. But Ben Montagu was a good-natured fellow in 


WITHOUT SIN 


47 


the main; as he was strong he was merciful, and much 
would be forgiven to the “ smart” young man who would 
dine in Portland Place once in a way, or consent to be seen 
with his handsome wife and daughters in their box at the 
opera. 

Ephraim Levinge was perfectly well acquainted with the 
anterior history of Benjamin Montagu. He knew just how 
clean his hands were, and what sort of documents he pre- 
ferred to have in his enormous iron sate. He knew that 
Benjamin Montagu was more than anxious to acquire another 
fortune by marrying his twenty -year-old son, Lionel, who 
was one degree removed from a congenital idiot. But he 
also knew that a number of very good people ate Mrs. Mon- 
tagues dinners and drank Mr. IMontagues wine, and that his 
pretty grand-daughter would meet on equal ground, at their 
house, many of the best men in London, and also the pink 
of Jewish aristocracy, such as the sons of the great Frank- 
fort bankers, Van Praag, and the co-heirs of Lucas Israels, 
the thrice millionaire of Amsterdam. Young Eugene Cohen 
was another frequenter of the Montagu household. There 
had been gossip about Mrs. Montagu and Eugene at one 
time, but now Bose and Linda were coming out, and Mrs. 
Cohen, Eugene’s mother, was known to be on the lookout 
for a wife for her soldier son. So with the certainty that 
at the Montagus’, or among their wealthy friends, Mary 
would meet a suitor worthy of her beauty and her fortune, 
the old man nodded his head and wrinkled up his mouth 
into a smile once more. 

Nine struck from the gilt empire clock. 

“Get the card-tables ready, Judith,” said Levinge. 

A game of cards was, with the exception of food, the only 
thing that ever roused Mrs. Marx into a semblance of activ- 
ity. She slowly rolled her bulky form off the sofa, and, 
assisted by Baird, drew out and prepared a table, passing 


48 


WITHOUT SIN 


her fat hands lovingly over the cards, and letting the carved 
pearl counters drop one by one with a subdued tinkle from 
her fingers. 

Once a month it was Ephraim Levinge’s custom to receive 
a few friends for cards and a quiet chat. The evenings were 
generally intolerably dull, especially for the ladies ; but the 
men who came usually transacted a little private business, 
or passed among themselves scraps of information which it 
would have been indiscreet to write. Since Mary had been 
back from school, a new element of interest had pervaded 
the gatherings. There was not a Jew in the community 
who did not know that Ephraim had built up a large for- 
tune, and that beyond an annuity to Mrs. Marx, the whole 
of it was willed to his grand-daughter ; and though most of 
Levinge’s guests would not have paraded the card parties 
in Bond Street among their social engagements, there was 
not one of them who would have demurred at fingering — by 
marriage — his fortune. 

The Montagus, bringing Mary with them, were the first 
to arrive. Mr. Benjamin Montagu was sanguine of com- 
plexion and red of hair. He was short and prosperously fat. 
His thick gold watch-chain proclaimed that beneath it re- 
posed an excellent dinner. A short moustache alone re- 
lieved his face from a likeness to a trumpet-blowing cherub. 
He wore a constant smile, even in business hours; and his 
one weak point was an undue partiality for the fair sex. 

Mrs. Montagu was dark and very pretty, with the clear 
olive skin and blue-black rippling hair which belongs to 
Portuguese women. Her features were delicate and fine, 
and, unlike most women who have grown-up families, she 
had preserved the svelte figure of a young girl. As a beauty, 
she permitted herself a few affectations, the chief of which 
was a marked lisp, which she had exaggerated with the idea 
of hiding a very common tribal defect of speech. 


WITHOUT SIN 


49 


She came into the room with her most gracious manner. 

“Ah, how-de-do, Mithter Levinge. Tho thweet of 
Mitheth Marx to let dear Mary come to uth. My girlth 
are tho fond of her, while ath to ” 

Ephraim Levinge looked upon all women as indiscreet, and 
did not allow Mrs. Montagu to commit herself and her 
family by finishing her sentence. 

“Good-evening, Ben!” he said to Mr. Montagu, who 
smiled a cordial greeting, while he winced at the familiarity. 

Mary glided into the room after the Montagus, and 
slipped over to Baird. She did not like Mr. Montagu at 
all ; he either chaffed her or paid her compliments, neither 
of which popular methods of ingratiation she very well 
understood. 

“Martin, let me sit by you all the evening. You don’t 
waut to play cards, do you?” she whispered, pulling a chair 
close to his and sitting down. “ Because, ” she went on, “ I 
want you to tell me all about the great Catherine of Eussia, 
to whom that Sevres tea-service, that grandfather bought 
yesterday, belonged. We never learnt much Eussian his- 
tory at school, so I want you to tell me something about it.” 

The idea of letting the mind of a young girl run riot 
among the details of a history of Eussia and its Imperial 
family curved Baird’s pale face into a rare smile. 

“ Mr. Isaac Mossenthal, ” announced the servant. 

Mr. Isaac Mossenthal was a man of middle age. A lofty 
square brow from which the grizzled dark hair was brushed 
straight back surmounted a pair of small keen eyes. The 
nose was thick, and the mouth, which was half buried in a 
black beard, was fleshy, though not unduly so. The char- 
acteristic love of jewellery and new clothes was undeveloped 
in him. In the City he was known as a successful importer 
of articles “ made in Germany,” though one of his best spec- 
ulations had consisted of vast consignments of bath slippers 


50 


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made in South Africa from dried grass. In Bayswater and 
semi-Bohemian circles he was known as Mrs. Mossenthal’s 
husband. He had a htart of gold, the temper of an angel, 
and the manners of a boor. 

It was characteristic of ^Sac Mossenthal that once a 
month he should spend an evening with old Levinge, and 
typical of Mrs. Mossenthal that on such occasions she should 
go to bed with a headache. Between the men there existed 
a slight tie of blood and a strong bond of business. Between 
Mrs. Mossenthal, who gave Sunday parties at her house in 
Cleveland Square that included the manager of the Crown 
Theatre, and the art dealer who lived over his own shop, 
and who only knew Christians in the way of trade, there 
could not be even an acquaintance. 

Mr. Mossenthal swung into the room with a rolling gait in- 
dicative of genial good-nature peculiarly his own, shook his 
kinsman by the hand cordially, nodded to Baird, professed 
himself proud to meet Mr. Montagu, touched the slim finger- 
tips of Mrs. Montagu, who except in Levinge’ s rooms did 
not know ’Sac Mossenthal at all, and after patting Mary’s 
smooth cheek, plumped himself down alongside Mrs. Marx, 
to whom he addressed sundry jocosities in a mixture of 
German and Yiddish fitted to her intelligence. 

The talk was general among the company for a few min- 
utes. Their faces, so different in colouring and expression, 
yet so markedly similar in feature, grew puffed and shiny 
in the hot room. Now and then Baird’s deep voice rang 
with bell-like clearness across their thick tones, or Mrs. 
Montagu’s exaggerated lisp was heard. Mrs. Marx and 
Mary spoke not at all. 

But ’Sac Mossenthal had not come out to talk about the 
financial state of the Free Schools, or the opposition to the 
proposed new synagogue in Maida Vale. His nervous 
energy, which found constant recuperation in frequent 


WITHOUT SIN 


51 


snatches of heavy sleep, demanded a perpetual variation of 
amusement and occupation. 

“ Here, I say, ain’t we going to have some cards? Mrs. 
Montagu,” and he bowed with clumsy gallantry in her 
direction, “owes us all a revenge. She walked off with 
everything last time.” 

Mrs. Montagu acknowledged the compliment to her clever- 
ness with a delightfully infantile giggle, which only half 
concealed her impatience to begin play at once. 

“We must wait for Mrs. Cohen,” said Ephraim Levinge. 
“It’s only fair, for she lost so much before.” 

As he spoke a large Jewess of the most markedly hand- 
some type sailed into the room, and by her presence at once 
made every one else feel overcrowded. Although she was 
the mother of a married daughter and a marriageable son, 
the raven blackness of her elaborately dressed hair was un- 
marred by a single silver thread. Her heavy features and 
ivory-tinted skin were lit up by a pair of eyes which still 
retained their fire, and which in her youth must have been 
exquisitely expressive and melting. Her huge figure, still 
heaving with the exertion of mounting the stairs, was em- 
phasised by a light-blue satin bodice fussed over with lace 
and ribbon, which made Mrs. Montagu’s plain black silk 
look quite dowdy, and Mrs. Marx’s purple plush tea-gown 
atrociously vulgar. 

Mrs. Cohen was greeted with considerable empressement. 
She was the queen of the Bayswater and Hotting Hill sets, 
and was the acknowledged link between them and Portland 
Place and Park Street. She could dine with the Mossen- 
thals and go on to a reception at the Montagus, which cir- 
cumstance argued a distinctly strong social position. She 
disapproved of Christians except, perhaps, to help to make 
a crowd at a dance, and to admit them to the intimacy of 
the home circle was in her eyes unnecessary, injudicious. 


52 


WITHOUT SIN 


and unorthodox. She tolerated Martin Baird as she might 
a servant, but would never take a hand at cards if he were 
included in the game. 

“Now we can play,” cried ’Sac Mossenthal, taking a place 
at the table and shuffling the cards with his supple fingers. 
“What’s it to be? Nap, poker — now, Mrs. Montagu, what 
do you say ?” 

“I thay Nap,” said Mrs. Montagu, forgetting all social 
distinctions, and dropping into the chair next Mossenthal. 

“Now, Mrs. Marx! now, Levinge! come on,” said ’Sac, 
thoroughly in his element, and diving his hand into the 
pocket of his rather shabby trousers to pull out a handful 
of gold and silver. “Now Mrs. Montagu, there’s a nice 
little pile for you to win,” and he laughed in a wide-mouthed 
fashion that made the crystal drops of an elaborate George 
IV. girandole quiver and tinkle. 

As the first round of cards was dealt, Mary slipped her 
small cool hand into Baird’s broad palm. 

“ Talk a little to me, Martin. Tell me something pretty. 
You have not told me anything for quite a week.” She 
pleaded as a child might plead for a fairy tale, tilting up 
her small fruit-shaped chin and smiling in his face. 

“ What shall I tell you about?” 

“ Tell me — tell me — ” she thought a moment, knitting her 
brows. Then suddenly she flashed her eyes upon him. 
“ Tell me why 1 do not like going to the Montagus' ? They 
are so kind, and always seem to want to have me with them, 
but I wish grandfather would let me stay at home. I am 
so happy here with my books and my stories ; those I make 
myself, you know, out of what you have told me.” 

Baird looked down at the wistful face fast growing so 
womanly in its outline. 

“ How old are you?” 

“Sixteen! Why, Martin, you know that,” 


WITHOUT SIN 


53 


Sixteen ! How time flies. Then if you are sixteen, 
you are too old to listen to an old man’s fairy tales. You 
must forget such things.” 

“Fairytales! Forget! Oh, Martin! Would you have 
me forget the chivalry of Arthur and Galahad, the Cru- 
saders who fought for their faith’s sake, the martyr Maid 
of Orleans? Must I cease dreaming of the dusky Moors 
who ruletl a kingdom from the Courts of the Alhambra, or 
of those mighty Teutons who lived among the fastnesses of 
the Ilhine and carved rich kingdoms for themselves out of 
nothingness? Martin, the stories of art and music are not 
fairy tales, they are the stories of many of my own people. 
Great kings, great warriors, great saints, were real. May 
I not think of them, of their wondrous lives — of their 
glorious deaths?” 

She dropped her voice to a faint whisper, a look of awe 
filled her eyes. 

“ Martin, the story of the Virgin is no fairy tale. Would 
you have me forget that?” 

“Mary, my dear, it is time you went to bed,” said 
Ephraim Levinge, without raising his eyes from his cards. 

“Good-night, Martin,” Mary said, as she left him, and 
gave a general “ good-night” to the card players. She bent 
her head for her grandfather’s blessing, then quietly quitted 
the room. 

“How that child grows!” said Mrs. Cohen, laying down 
her cards, and with her big ox-eyes noting every swelling 
line of the young girl’s figure as she crossed the room. 

Mrs. Montagu grasped the situation at once, and though 
she was winning, dropped her cards on the table and turned 
to old Levinge. 

“ I thuppoth, Mr. Levinge, that you will be looking for 
a huthbande for Mary thoon?” 

“Oh, surely not yet!” cried Mrs. Cohen, pulling herself 


54 


WITHOUT SIN 


together, and guessing at the motive which had induced Mrs. 
Montagu to come out in the dowdy black gown. 

“ Mary is more than sixteen, ” interposed Ben Montagu, 
ranging himself on the side of his wife and prepared to fight 
for his own. “ I married Mrs. Montagu on her sixteenth 
birthday.” 

Mrs. Montagu grew scarlet, Mr. Montagu purple, and 
Mrs. Cohen sailed in triumphantly. 

‘‘Ah, but you forget in England such things are not done. 
Seventeen is quite soon enough for a girl to be married.” 

The hit at Mrs. Montagu’s suspicious origin was palpable. 
Mrs. Cohen pursued her advantage. 

“And twenty -five for a man. Now my Eugene will be 
twenty -five next January. Come, Mr. Levinge, why not 
make a match between the young people?” 

Mrs. Cohen brought the full battery of her fine eyes to 
bear on the old man, who glanced sharply at her from 
between his goid-rimmed spectacles and his heavy brows. 

“ But I do not think that Mary hath ever theen your thon, 
Mrs. Cohen,” cried Mrs. Montagu, determined to die hard. 

“Young people should be allowed a certain latitude,” 
added Ben Montagu, following his wife’s lead. 

“Now our thon Lionel thimply doath on Mary. He 
callth her hith little friend; it’th quite too thweet to thee 
them together,” gushed Mrs. Montagu, lisping more than 
ever. 

“ Mary is a good girl. I dare say she is kind to the poor 
lad,” said Mrs. Cohen, firing another shaft into the Port- 
land Place camp. 

This reference to the Montagu’s afflicted son was a cruel 
cut; and old Levinge, who saw signs of a serious difference 
between his guests, thought it was time to interfere. 

“My grand-daughter won’t be able to marry until she is 
eighteen. I have willed it so. Mrs. Cohen, what do you go?” 


WITHOUT SIN 


56 


^Sac ^[osseiitlial, who during the pause in the game had 
snatched a refreshing sleep, started up in his chair, glanced 
at his cards, and cried : 

“I go Nap.’’ 

The game went on. 

Baird, with his big lean hands shielding his eyes from the 
lamplight, stared across to where the card players sat. He 
noted how bent and old and feeble was Levinge, the grey 
shadows about his mouth, the palsied tremble of his knotted 
hands. He saw the animal indifference of Judith Marx, 
her gross face only waking to life as the coin piled before 
her grew or melted. He guessed the plans which were 
weaving in the brains of the two women. . Mrs. Cohen would 
deem any girl fortunate who could call her handsome scape- 
grace son, husband ; and Mrs. Montagu, who longed for a 
rich daughter-in-law to support her social claims, her girlish 
prettiness being somewhat shadowed by an idiot son, and 
the unbusinesslike extravagance of a faithless spouse. 

Then Baird thought of Mary — Mary with her child’s 
heart and her white soul, with the halo of absolute innocence 
about her brows, and the visions of dead centuries in her 
calm eyes. He thought of the shadow of great wealth 
which hung .above her, and of the snares her own people 
would set for her feet, and he sighed. 

Downstairs in the dimly lighted Art Gallery, Mary stood 
before the Virgin’s picture. 

“He told me to forget,” she cried. “To forget every- 
thing, to forget you, dear lady. Some memories might 
fade, but your story — ah, how could that? Whenever I 
look in the glass I see you. Every time they call me they 
speak your name. When strangers see me here, they look 
and whisper and point at you. God took my mother from 
me, but you — the mother of one whom some men call God 
— are here. Guard me, keep me, love me with the mother 


56 


WITHOUT SIN 


love I lack; teach me to be like you, let my life be as yours. 
Oh, mother — mother!’’ 

In an access of hysterical passion the girl flung herself on 
her knees before the picture. Her straining eyes, piercing 
the ever-moving shadows, fancied the sweet mouth smiled, 
and the pale hands reached down and blessed her. With a 
strangled sob of ecstasy she fell forward in a swoon. 


CHAPTEE VI 


Dr. Noel Marrable’s waiting-rooms were always crowded 
between the hours of ten and two. His patients were prin- 
cipally women, who fluttered and rustled as they clicked 
their French heels across the broad tessellated hall of the 
old-fashioned house in Harley Street, and left fragrant 
memories of their presence in waiting or consulting rooms. 

The women who waited with such wonderful patience in 
the low panelled rooms, with little beyond a fashion paper 
or a whispered chat to pass the time, were mostly young, 
and nearly all pretty. Even the plain ones assumed an air 
of coquettish grace and their freshest millinery when visiting 
the most fashionable doctor of the day. 

Dr. Noel Marrable’s fame and fortune had been made five 
years back, when he had flatly refused to again attend the 
Duchess of Melton, who had received him on his first visit 
in a 2)eig7ioir and without her wig. From that hour, 

to be a patient of Dr. Marrable’s was, in the eyes of women- 
kind, a patent of beauty, fashion, and smartness. 

A few great ladies patronised him because he was really 
a clever physician, but the majority of his admirers flocked 
to his consulting-room and paid their two guineas for five 
minutes’ chat, because it was the thing to do, and without 
in the least caring whether he prescribed for their symptoms 
or not. 

Dr. Marrable was the type of man after whom, with the 
slightest encouragement, women will run. Tall and spare 
of figure, grave and rather forbidding of face, he yet ex- 


58 


WITHOUT SIN 


haled a strong sense of virility. His hands, white, smooth 
and firm of touch, were essentially the hands of a man first, 
and a surgeon afterwards. Plis manner was sufficiently 
courtly, but never servile. His features, which, were hard, 
more from a habit of strong self -repression than by nature, 
were rugged and large, the short upper lip was generally 
pressed closely upon its fellow, and his eyes, (piick and 
dark, looked out with an ostentatiously professional glance 
upon the world. The delicate arch of the high brows and 
the tender modelling of the full round chin, which like the 
rest of his face, was clean-shaven, were indicative of pas- 
sions which required the constant guard of the hard mouth 
and cold eyes. But saint or sinner, harshly indifferent or 
professionally sympathetic. Dr. Marrable was an adored 
personality among women. He was odd — he was the fash- 
ion — he was stoically unmoved by the veriest coquette who 
ever carried her frills and fascinations across his threshold, 
and that despite the crowning fact that he was unmarried. 

Scores of most beautiful women, whose names figured in 
Debrett or The Era or whose millions were quoted on Wall 
Street, wives, widows, and maids had entered his small, 
fiower-scented sanctum, where the sun shone through panes 
of old cathedral glass, and the firelight flickered on a hun- 
dred rare toys of ivory and silver, had determined to bring 
this latter-day St. Anthony to their feet. But the loveliest 
eyes, dewy with an unexpressed desire, the whitest, most 
dimpled wrist throbbing with a hidden passion, mutely ap- 
pealed in vain. Yet continued failure served to add zest to 
the chase, and every week found the crush round his doors 
growing greater. 

Take my card to Dr. Marrable, and ITl wait in the little 
ante-room.” 

The servant bowed low as Lady St. Cyprien spoke, and 
at once opened for her an invisible door cut in the oak panel- 


WITHOUT SIN 


59 


ling of the hall, which gave entrance to a wedge-shaped 
passage next the consulting-room. 

“Tell the doctor I shall not keep him a moment,” said 
Lady St. Cyprien, sinking into a chair. 

But she had hardly spoken when a door at the far end of 
the room opened, and Dr. Noel Marrable entered. The 
clear light from a window in the ceiling showed the silver 
which at thirty-five already sprinkled his dark hair and the 
clustering lines about his deep eyes, but a rare smile curved 
his hard mouth, as he advanced to Lady St. Cyprien. 

“ I thought it was your voice, ” he said brightly, “ and 
Stansdale, who is here, wasting my time over imaginary com- 
plaints, confirmed my suspicions — said that not another 
woman in the world has a voice like his Aunt Adela.” 

“ Stansdale! is he with you?” Then as she caught sight 
of the tall young soldier who stood before the fire, she said 
anxiously, “My dear boy, why are you here? Are you ill?” 

Lord Stansdale, straight as a young fir-tree, fair and de- 
bonair as an Englishman should be, made a reverence to 
his aunt. 

“My dear aunt, why are you here? Are you ill?” 

“Nonsense, Stansdale, 1 have only come to consult Dr. 
Marrable — oh! you needn’t run away — it’s nothing about 
myself.” 

But Dr. Marrable looked at the clock and said : 

“ You must go now, my dear fellow. It’s nearly eleven, 
and Collins said half an hour ago that the waiting-rooms 
were full. I’ll meet you this evening at the club.” 

“Collins is quite right,” said Lady St. Cyprien. “You 
have a week’s patients in the house. That dreadful Mrs. 
Mossenthal drove up just in front of me. I interrupted her 
suborning Collins to give her an early turn. Stansdale, 
wait outside for me, the victoria is there.” 

Alone, Dr. Marrable at once dropped the warmer manner 


60 


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with which he had greeted Lady St. Cyprien. Drawing 
apart the skirts of his severely cut frock coat, he sat down 
in a wide carved oak chair, and turned his face towards his 
visitor. 

Lady St. Cyprien laughed. 

“ You needn’t put on the professional mask just yet, 
Noel. Will you never remember that your mother was my 
girlhood’s friend, and that I have dandled you — ay, and 
scolded you too, a hundred times!” she cried. ‘‘I am all 
right — thanks to you of course — but I want to bring a little 
friend of mine to see you.” 

‘‘Certainly,” said Marrable, drawing an ivory tablet 
towards him and preparing to write down the name of his 
prospective patient. 

“ Or better still, come in to tea with me one afternoon and 
meet her. She is the daughter of old Levinge, the art dealer 
in Bond Street. I take some interest in the child. She is 
peculiarly lonely in her home life, really striking in appear- 
ance, and singularly free from racial attributes.” 

“And why cannot she come to me?” said Marrable. 

“ Because I do not think she would. 1 call her a child, 
but she is past sixteen, and although lovable and almost 
weak where her affections are concerned, she has a consider- 
able strain of her grandfather’s will power. Also she is 
shy and nervous — she would not speak to you or tell you 
anything if I brought her here.” 

“ Her complaint?” said Marrable, laconic and on the 
verge of boredom. 

“My dear man, if I knew I shouldn’t trouble you. The 
girl is full of fancies — but not whimsical, you understand. 
She is too sweet-natured for that. She has a trick of faint- 
ing too, and is also prone to introspective musings. If she 
had a mother I should not trouble about her, but she is at a 
critical age, when the woman is evolved from the girl, and 


WITHOUT SIN 


61 


it would be a pity if she grew up as neurotic and mentally 
undisciplined as so many of the present-day young women.” 

Dr. Marrable rose before he spoke. 

‘‘ I dare say Miss Levin ge — if that is her name — is merely 
a little anaemic and hysterical. It’s extraordinary how 
highly strung some of these Jews are; many of them are 
literally at snapping-point. Why, those waiting-rooms of 
mine are half full of the ‘chosen people’ at this moment.” 

“Doctor, I’ll take your hint, and leave you to your 
patients. When will you come to see your new one?” 

“Next Wednesday at live. Good-morning.” 

Five minutes later Lady St. Cyprien with Lord Stansdale 
was bowling across Cavendish Square. 

“ How is my uncle?” began the young guardsman. 

“ Very well indeed, and anxious to congratulate you on 
your captaincy. Won’t you come in to luncheon to-day?” 

“Thanks, I shall be delighted.” Then after a pause he 
said, “Aunt Adela, who is that pretty child who drives 
with you sometimes? A very fair girl, with charming 
eyes?” 

Lady St. Cyprien smiled. 

“Oh! so you’ ve noticed her, have you?” 

“No one could help it, there’s something awfully 
striking in her appearance.” 

“ You are right. Mary is pretty, very pretty, with just 
that air of appealing helplessness, which, if women only 
knew it, has the most irresistible attraction for men — who 
are men. But, my dear boy, she has another charm, besides 
her yellow hair and sweet eyes. She is — or will be — 
enormously wealthy.” 

Lord Stansdale laughed. 

“And where did you find her? No one I ever come 
across can even guess at who she is. Don’t say she is an 
American, and that you are going to ‘exploit’ her.” 


62 


WITHOUT SIN 


“ Good heaven ! no. St. Cyprien would never hear of 
such a thing. The little girl is the grand-daughter of 
Ephraim Levinge.’’ 

Lord Stansdale turned round in the carriage, and regard- 
less of manners stared in Lady St. Cyprien’ s face. 

“ Ephraim Levinge!” he cried. ‘‘Then the girl belongs 
to a shop and is a Jewess.” 

“Certainly,” replied Lady St. Cyprien very quietly. 
“Now, my dear Stansdale, it is no use your looking 
shocked. I and your uncle have known Levinge for fifteen 
years, first as a clever workman, then as that still rarer 
thing, an honest art dealer. It was Levinge who saved St. 
Cyprien from making a fool of himself over that forged 
piece of Henri II. ware, and it has been entirely under 
Levinge’ s guidance that our art collection has been made. 
Of course he is a Jew— the most despised of his race, a Po- 
lish Jew. No one knows his real name, or even whether he 
has one, but he has always dealt fairly by us, and saved us 
from being swindled by others of his class.” 

“ He may be a good tradesman, and all that — probably 
is,” said Stansdale, his handsome, fair face expressing in- 
voluntary disgust — “but I don’t see that even that justifies 
you in taking the child, pretty though she be, about with 
you.” 

“Your uncle is the best judge of that,” said Lady St. 
Cyprien, drawing herself up with dignity. Then her face 
softened, and she gently laid a hand on one of the young 
man’s. 

“ Ah ! my dear, cannot you understand what it means to 
St. Cyprien and myself to be childless? You have been 
his ward, you will be his heir, but you are not our own son. 
We are not young any longer, and we want a daughter 
about us, some one with a sunny smile, a sweet low voice, 
a light footstep. One day, Stansdale, you will marry, and 


WITHOUT SIN 


03 


your wife and your children will be half ours. Till then, 
you must let me keep my little girl, as I call her.'' 

Silence fell between the two, as the carriage swept down 
Great Cumberland Place and into the Park. Only Stans- 
dale pressed the hand of this woman, whom he had known 
since his babyhood as a great leader of society, whose word 
was law, whose favour was accounted almost Koyal, and 
yet whose loveless heart yearned over a girl child of an 
alien people, whose empty arms clung round the frail sup- 
port of an old Jew's grand-daughter. Presently Lady St. 
Cyprien spoke again. 

“No doubt you wonder, Stansdale, why I have never 
adopted as a daughter one of the many well-born yet poor 
girls of my own set. But so doing would have entailed the 
anxieties of chaperonage— a thankless task in these days — 
and have raised expectancies of settlements and dowries St. 
Cyprien might not feel inclined to fulfil. With Mary 
Levinge it is quite different. The child has a beautiful 
disposition, which has not been spoiled by over-education. 
Old Levinge, who is immensely proud of her, has made her 
his heiress, and has even bought the house in which she 
will live after his death. She wears little cotton gowns 
and goes afoot unless I take her driving, at present, but 
that is Levinge’ s way. When he dies, she will be mistress 
of herself and half a million of money. Her fortune and 
her beauty must make her a personage in any society she 
may drift into. Her own people will be certain to try and 
catch her and her heritage, but she is too good for them. 
She should move in higher circles than those of what is 
called Hyde Park. She should marry a great artist or 
poet, some one could understand her idyllic nature — or — 
even a man of old family — for in these days the shop is so 
quickly forgotten, and money gets fumigated in passing 
through the bank. One day I'll introduce you to Mary. 


64 


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She will not talk to you much, but she will look at you 
with those eyes of hers, that always seem to see through 
and beyond you, and she will probably invest you with the 
attributes of a Galahad or Lohengrin. She is a very 
strange child.” 


CHAPTEE VII 


After Lady St. Cyprien^s explanation, Lord Stansdale 
ceased to be astonished when he saw Mary Levinge seated 
in the high-hung family barouche, and gave up his time to 
thinking what a pretty child she was. One day he noticed 
— with the trained eye for femininities which is part and 
parcel of a young man in society — that the child’s flowing 
hair was bound into a soft knot at the back of her head, 
and that as she followed Ladj^ St. Cyprien from the car- 
riage her slender feet were no longer visible. She was in 
long gowns, she was grown up, and in the light of that fact 
Lord Stansdale began to look upon her with a difference. 

As Mary grew and blossomed into womanhood the lamp 
of Ephraim Levinge’ s life began to burn very low. For 
two years past the business had practically been managed 
by Martin Baird, the old man only seeing his most valued 
patrons. All during the winter he had huddled, a breath- 
ing mummy, before a big fire in the upstairs room over- 
looking Bond Street. His bedroom was both warmer and 
quieter, but he preferred the front room, for from there he 
could hear the Pactolus tide of London — the river out of 
which he had drawn his fortune — roar, day by day, and 
could distinguish the abrupt clatter with which carriages 
drew up before his own door. 

As the spring came he moved to the window, but he 
never got downstairs. During those times Martin Baird 
came to be like one of the family, for every night he 
brought up the details of the daily work. Mary, too, was 
5 


66 


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wakened from her dreams. Faced with practical business, 
for as evening after evening the big centre-table was spread 
with ledgers, letter-books, and price lists, the dormant 
acumen of her race was roused, and the young girl, with 
puckered brows and pursed lips, would wade down columns 
of figures and pages of valuations. One night, Baird, dis- 
tressed by her efforts to grasp an unusually intricate 
account, tried to draw the book from her, but the old Jew 
laid his claw -like bloodless hand upon his arm. 

It is full time she should learn, Martin. She will want 
the knowledge — very soon now.” 

But he rallied as May fulfilled its promise of warm soft 
airs and lengthening perfumed days. In May fell Mary’s 
birthday — the day that completed her eighteen years. 
Friends were expected that evening in honour of the event ; 
not grand people, such as the Montagus or Cohens, but 
quiet folk, who spoke a garbled tongue which Mary did not 
understand and who put their hats on for grace. They 
were toilers from the other side of the city, Kussians, 
Poles, and Germans. They had known Ephraim Levinge 
in his huckstering and starving days, before ever he took 
the little child to be his own, and her birthday was the one 
occasion in each twelve months when Levinge shook hands 
with the past. 

Mrs. Marx, roused from her apathy by the prospect of 
meeting friends after her own heart, had donned a faded 
bed-gown, and was busy in the kitchen, recalling the 
primitive cookery of her youth. 

Mary, in the white frock it was her fancy to always 
wear, was seated with her grandfather, showing him with 
natural girlish pleasure the gifts she had received. 

“ See, grandfather, what a lovely ring from the Mon- 
tagus, and such a pretty fan from Rose. Mrs. Cohen 
sends me this — she slipped a heavy gold bangle over her 


WITHOUT SIN 


67 


white wrist— and from her son a scent bottle. I don’t 
know why, for I hardly know him. This— oh! this silver 
box is from dear Mr. Mossenthal— it was kind of him to 
remember. The Lowes gave me books, and the Symons a 
sachet, and Martin — dear old Martin— some lilies.” 

She dropped her voice and passed her fingers reverently 
over the great sheaf of Mary lilies she held in her 
hands. 

“What a lot of friends 1 have, grandfather; how kind 
every one is to give me presents.” 

The old man thrust his grand-daughter’s little treasures 
away with a sweep of his shrunken arm. 

“Friends! Presents!” he cried, in his quavering voice. 
“ Rubbish, my dear, rubbish. Wait and see what your 
grandfather gives you before the day is out.” 

His head sank on his breast again, and he closed his eyes 
for a moment. 

“ Please sir. Lady St. Cyprien would like to know how 
you are to-day, and can she see Miss Mary.” 

“Go! my dear, go!” said Levinge, rousing himself ; and 
Mary left the room still holding the scented lilies against 
her heart. 

It was early yet, barely eleven o’clock, and the Art 
Gallery was empty save for Lady St. Cyprien, wearing a 
gown the silvery tints of which matched her hair. 

“I remembered this was your birthday, my child,” she 
said in her soft clear voice. “ And as you are quite grown 
up now, I have brought you what all young ladies should 
number among their first jewels.” She opened a case con- 
taining a string of pearls. “Now, no thanks, my dear. 
Girls wear diamonds nowadays while they are still in short 
frocks. But I am old-fashioned enough to think that 
a pretty skin and bright eyes need no such setting. 
Diamonds should come only after marriage, so till that day 


68 


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arrives, my dear child, wear the pearls with all my love 
and blessings.” 

Lady St. Cyprien drew the girl towards her and kissed 
her forehead, then cried in a gayer tone, “ What lovely 
flowers!” 

“Martin Baird gave them to me,” Mary replied simply. 
“They are Mary’s lilies, you know. And as my name is 
Mary, and I was born in Mary’s month, he thought I 
should like them.” 

Against her will. Lady St. Cyprien glanced from Mary 
to the pure pictured face which still held one small corner 
of the Gallery. The girl followed her eyes. 

“ I am still like her, you see. Lady St. Cyprien. Some- 
times when I look in the glass, it almost frightens me, it is 
as though the painted face had come between me and my 
reflection.” She stood alongside the picture, as she had 
done before, and Lady St. Cyprien looked, striving not to 
see the marvellous resemblance. 

Tint for tint, line for line, the faces were alike, and both 
— the real and the sham — carried the mark of Fate, the 
premonition of Destiny, the shadow of coming Sorrow. 
With a little laugh that was almost hysterical, it was so 
strained, Lady St. Cyprien cried : 

“ No doubt, my dear, the likeness is there, but you must 
remember it is merely a chance. There are thousands of 
pictures of the Virgin in the world to which you do not 
bear the faintest resemblance. You are too old now to 
encourage childish fancies, and will have other things to 
think about. You are very pretty, and will be a young 
woman of importance. The next few years should be your 
happiest, and I, my dear child, intend to try and make 
them so.” 

Mary scarcely smiled as she answered : 

“ You are more than kind to me. Lady St. Cyprien, but 


WITHOUT SIN 


69 


you must not think I am ungrateful if I say that I feel 
sorrow is not far from me now.” 

She half turned towards the picture and spoke as though 
addressing it. “I do not think 1 shall have a very happy 
life.” 

Scarcely had the words left her lips than a wild cry — 
the wail which the untaught woman gives in the presence 
of death — rang through the house. 

Baird dashed across the Gallery and through the private 
door upstairs. Lady St. Cyprien, with the girl’s mournful 
words still sighing in her ears, turned very pale. Mary 
stood like stone, only she let her flowers slip in a fragrant 
silver heap to the floor. 

The awful cry was once again repeated, then Baird’s voice 
broke the silenc.e. 

“ Miss Levinge, your grandfather is dead!” 

With unconventional consideration Lady St. Cyprien 
softly turned away and passed into the street. 

The click of the closing door roused Mary from her 
shocked stupor. She drew herself up, and with the uncon- 
scious dignity of a new responsibility, said : 

“Lower the shutters at once, Martin.” Then she went 
slowly upstairs, for the weight of her grandfather’s birth- 
day gift was very heavy upon her. 


CHAPTEK VIII 


Mrs. Isaac Mossenthal’s drawing-room in Cleveland 
Square was the very perfection of the decorator’s art, as 
embodied by quantities of machine-turned white enamelled 
woodwork arranged at inconvenient angles, and fragments 
of limp silk hung from brass rods over unnecessary aper- 
tures. Mrs. Mossenthal’s reception gown of shot mauve 
and blue silk was as fashionable as the “period” of her 
drawing-room, and both were equally unbecoming to the 
lady, who sat in a precise attitude awaiting her visitors. 

It was Mrs. Mossenthal’s “At^ome” day, a function 
which she observed with the important punctiliousness 
which characterised all her actions. Mrs. Mossenthal was 
a woman who harboured an idea that in her own world she 
was a person of considerable importance and power. A 
fair income, spent with extreme care and study of external 
show, and a wonderful knack of getting things out of 
people, had gained for her a reputation for having wealth, 
and of lavishly spending it. A fine contempt for all of her 
husband’s and most of her own relations had further 
enhanced her social status in Bayswater. 

“She’s a Jewess, of course, but you never meet Jews at 
her parties,” was frequently said of Mrs. Mossenthal, and 
she prided herself on deserving the encomium, for her 
dinner lists were compiled with a view to keeping the races 
as distinct as possible, and she openly boasted that she did 
not keep a Kosher house. 

Punctually at half-past three a lady of enormous propor- 


WITHOUT SIN 


n 


tions was announced. She was an aunt of Mrs. Mossen- 
thaPs, and considered that she would be outraging tradi- 
tional family affection by not paying her respects to her 
fashionable niece once a month. She lived in Islington 
and was frankly provincial. 

For a quarter of an hour she cross-questioned Mrs. 
Mossenthal on family affairs, and then, refusing tea which 
was tentatively offered her, lumbered heavily away. 

“Thank goodness! no one came while she was here,” 
said Eachel Mossenthal to herself. “ She is the most hate- 
ful old wretch in creation.” 

Having relieved her feelings, Mrs. Mossenthal again 
settled her high shoulders squarely against the back of a 
chair and awaited the next comers. She did not read. 
She considered it waste of time to read novels, and library 
subscriptions cost money and made no show. Newspapers 
were untidy, and moreover she thought it a confession of 
weakness to study the papers much. A woman with any 
wits could keep sufficiently au courant with the world’s 
affairs by listening to what other people said. The Times 
was left at the house every morning for an hour, and the 
head-lines were rattled through aloud to Mrs. Mossenthal 
by an indigent ex-governess who wrote notes, sent out 
invitations, and executed other odd jobs which were outside 
the range of a servant’s duties. 

Instead of reading, therefore, Eachel Mossenthal in- 
dulged in thought. With her this was not a mental exercise 
of a very lofty order. It ranged between a scheme for 
getting tickets for the opera on Saturday for nothing, to 
what advantage she could sell the bay cob which had taken 
to kicking dreadfully, whether her next dinner-party 
should include the Tauntons, about whose position in the 
City there were unpleasant rumours, and a little more to the 
like purpose. 


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Scarcely were these knotty points settled when callers 
began to arrive, and the tiny tea-cups, jam sandwiches, and 
sugared cakes were speedily in circulation. 

Mrs. Mossenthahs “celebrities,” as she called her the- 
atrical and artistic acquaintances, seldom if ever troubled 
her on “at-home” days, and the talk that meandered 
among the pseudo-Eastern cosy corners and early English 
chimney seats was limited to puerilities. 

It was past five before a breath of the outer world entered 
in the embodiment of Mr. Bertie Chant. He fluttered into 
the room in a more than usually exuberant and expansive 
state. His cherubic face glowed with a crude redness 
which he would have termed “so rudely healthy,” but his 
voluminous scarf and the fresh buttonhole were above 
reproach. 

He held his hat, stick, and one glove shoulder high as 
he entered. 

“Dear lady!” he cried, tripping across the polished floor 
to Mrs. Mossenthal, who received his elaborate greeting 
with the mechanical action of the muscles of her hard 
mouth, which did duty for a smile. 

“And Mrs. Cohen, and your daughter. Miss Julia, I 
declare, looking charming in that toilet,” went on Mr. 
Chant, executing a species of chassee cvoissee over to where 
Mrs. Cohen and a pretty, young girl, with melting dark 
eyes and a clear olive skin, sat eating jam sandwiches. 

His respects paid, he looked around at the half-dozen 
ladies who were sitting about. 

“ Quite a reception, I declare, but then we all love dear 
Mrs. Mossenthal. But — ” here he carefully laid his hat, 
stick, and glove aside and began to remove his second 
glove. “You have not heard the news.” 

“News! what news,” said Mrs. Mossenthal, while si- 
lence fell upon the room. • 


WITHOUT SIN 


73 


Filled with a sense of importance, Mr. Chant’s round 
smooth face expanded into a wide smile, which, as he 
suddenly remembered the nature of the intelligence he 
had to convey, reduced itself into an appropriate air of 
gloom. 

“ It’s about old Ephraim Levinge, the celebrated Bond 
Street art dealer you know ” 

Mrs. Mossenthal’s face changed. Her sallow skin 
turned green, her bloodless lips tightened to a slit. Any 
mention of her husband’s relationship to old Ephraim 
Levinge — a man who kept a shop — a man who once had 
the effrontery to tell her that everything “old” in her 
house was new and in the worst taste — put her in a temper. 
She made up her mind that if Bertie Chant mentioned the 
connection, she would never ask him to one of her Sunday 
dinner-parties again. 

“ Yes?” exclaimed Mrs. Cohen, setting down her cup. 
“What about him?” 

But Mr. Bertie Chant had his own way of telling a story. 
He began by putting on a pair of gold-mounted pince-nez, 
which he considered gave him an air of distinction. 

“ Well, it is quite a paragraph for the society papers. I 
shall send it to three to-night. You must know that to-day 
being the private view at the Decadents’ Gallery, I was 
going, all in my best, you know, down Bond Street, about 
mid-day. All the ‘smarties’ go to these shows before 

luncheon now. The show folk and J ,” he swallowed a 

word and grew alarmingly red, “suburban people make up 
the crowd in the afternoon. Well, I had just parted from 
Lord Arthur Carr — such a delightful fellow, we sup to- 
gether at the Savoy to-night — when I fell, yes, wasn’t it 
shocking? positively fell up against that dear Lady St. 
Cyprien.” 

The listening faces grew more attentive, and Julia 


74 


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Cohen, who had been quietly masticating a sweet biscuit, 
suddenly became immobile. 

“I apologised, of course, and her la’ ship, who is quite 
the most delightful woman in London, was as charming as 
ever. But when she had received my apologies, she told me 
— poor dear, quite with tears in her eyes — that she was most 
upset — she had just been present at old Levinge’s death.” 

^‘Ephraim Levinge dead!” 

“Lady St. Cyprien with him when he died.” 

“ Impossible!” 

The last remark fell from Mrs. Mossenthal, who could 
not resist an incredulous sneer at the expense of the dead 
art dealer. 

Mrs. Cohen noted the expression, and assumed her most 
Junoesque air. She only tolerated Mrs. Mossenthal on 
sufferance, and had long ago made up her mind that once 
her son Eugene was married to Mary Levinge, the Mossen- 
thals should not be included in the visiting list of the young 
people. 

“Not impossible at all, Mrs. Mossenthal,” she exclaimed 
severely. “Ephraim Levinge was much respected among 
the aristocracy, and I know for a fact that Lord and Lady 
St. Cyprien held him in high regard.” 

The reflected glory of a peeress’s patronage of a dying 
Jew was already irradiating the faces of the assembled 
ladies, when Mr. Chant again spoke. 

“ Well, I won’t quite declare that she was in the room, 
but any way she was in the house or shop, or somewhere. 
So sweet of her, wasn’t it?” 

A drawling voice with a strong twang through it spoke 
from the vicinity of the tea-table. 

“ Hasn’t Levinge left a grand-daughter, or is there only 
the rag-bag woman Marx, who can’t speak English, left to 
look after the shop?” 


WITHOUT SIN 


75 


The speaker was a little woman with a long nose, black 
hair, cut short and curled, and the reputation of being a 
great wit. She had once written an article for a weekly 
paper, which after considerable manipulation by the editor 
had appeared in print. This had given her a great reputa- 
tion in Hyde Park and South Kensington society, which 
had been further enhanced by the daring with which she 
discussed unpleasant topics, under the plea of cultivating 
what she called “higher philosophy.” 

A general giggle at Mrs. Dan Goldschmidt’s sally re- 
lieved the tension of silence. 

“Oh, Mrs. Dan!” laughed Mr. Chant. “What a way 
you have of putting things! Of course there’s a grand- 
daughter, eighteen, and beautiful to boot — quite the mar- 
riageable damsel, I assure you. Lady St. Cyprien tells me 
that she has all Levinge’s savings and the business, and 
will be worth every penny of ” 

Mrs. Cohen hastily rose. She had no intention of allow- 
ing Mary Levinge’s monetary value to become the tea-table 
talk of the community, before she had had time to make 
plans for an immediate onslaught on such a desirable partie. 

“Ah, yes, there’s Mary — poor child, she must be in 
great grief — and she will get no help or comfort from that 
aunt of hers.” 

“Lady St. Cyprien said the aunt was howling like a 
Dervish when she came away,” said Bertie Chant, “but 
that Miss Levinge seemed quite controlled.” 

“She has such a grand character,” sighed Mrs. Cohen. 
“ She is a girl for whom I have a very deep and sincere 
affection. Julia, my love, we must go to Bond Street at 
once, and if necessary bring Mary away to stay with us, 
until some arrangement can be made for her.” 

“But Miss Levinge has a home of her own,” said Bertie 
Chant. 


WITHOUT SIN 


7G 


“La, isn’t she going to serve in the shop?” twanged 
Mrs. Dan Goldschmidt. 

“You dreadful person!” cried Bertie, flapping his glove 
at her. “ Good gracious, no ! Levinge bought and fur- 
nished a big house in Regent’s Park for her nearly two 
years ago. She’ll move there almost directly, I expect. 
Oh, it’s quite a delightful story for the papers!” 

“ And play at being the great lady, I suppose,” said Mrs. 
Mossenthal spitefully. 

“My dear Mrs. Mossenthal,” said Mrs. Cohen, in her 
most regal manner. “ You must remember, we must all 
remember, that if Miss Levinge — Mary, as I call her, for I 
have known her since she was a child — makes anything of 
a marriage, she will not have to play at being a great lady — 
she will be a great lady. I have reason to believe— poor 
Mr. Levinge had no secrets from me — that Mary’s fortune 
will be a very large one. Now, Julia, my child — Good- 
bye, Mrs. Mossenthal — shall you wear mourning?” 

Mrs. Mossenthal rose stiffly from her chair. She was 
too rawboned a woman to move with any grace. 

“I beg your pardon, Mrs. Cohen,” she said in her cold, 
high voice, and with her light eyes glistening ominously; 
“ but if Mary Levinge is to go anywhere between now and 
the time she moves into her new house, she should come 
here. We are her relations.” 

Mrs. Cohen was only momentarily baffled. 

“But you do not know her, Mrs. Mossenthal, and at 
such a time a stranger’s face ” 

“’Sac has known her since she was a child,” retorted 
Mrs. Mossenthal, who was not going to lose the chance of 
laying the heiress under obligations without a struggle. 

“The child will yearn for womanly sympathy, ’’ began 
Mrs. Cohen again. 

Then Bertie Chant, who had been discussing the “ higher 


WITHOUT SIN 77 

philosophy,” as applied to a recent nasty divorce case, with 
Mrs. Dan Goldschmidt, turned round and said : 

“ What’s that about motherly sympathy? Miss Levinge 
will get plenty of that. Lady St. Cyprien meant to fetch 
Miss Levinge away from Bond Street this afternoon and 
keep her at Lowndes Square till after the funeral, and her 
own house is ready for her.” 

Full of the news they had gathered, Mrs. Mossenthal’s 
guests went away, leaving only Mrs. Cohen to face her 
hostess in the sham artistic drawing-room. 

Both women forgot for a moment their manners in 
thought. Mrs Cohen, with the tribal passion for accumu- 
lating wealth through good marriages burning in her veins, 
was wondering what reason Lady St. Cyprien, whom she 
knew to be childless, had for putting herself out sufficiently 
to take the mourning girl into her house. Mrs. Mossenthal, 
with envious discontent, was marvelling what advantage 
a wealthy leader of society could get out of the grand- 
daughter of an art dealer. 

One thing they instinctively felt must be done. Their 
sentiments of affection and love must be conveyed to Mary 
Levinge at once. Mrs. Cohen wanted her for her son, 
Mrs. Mossenthal for her own personal glorification. Their 
claims must be made without delay. Besides, the chance 
of calling at a countess’s house, and perhaps making her 
acquaintance, was not to be lost. 

Mrs. Mossenthal was the less patient of the two, and 
broke silence first. 

“’Sac will insist upon my calling to see Mary to- 
morrow. ” 

“ Shall you go to Lady St. Cyprien’s?” said Mrs. Cohen, 
advancing cautiously and almost smothering the surprise in 
her voice. 

“ Certainly,” replied the other, tightening all her features 


78 


WITHOUT SIN 


as she spoke. “ Bertie said that Mary was to leave Bond 
Street to-day.” 

“Yes! it will be the best plan,” said Mrs. Cohen in 
reflective tones, as though she were confirming a suggestion 
made by herself. “ About when shall you go?” 

“ To-morrow. I think it looks more friendly to go soon.” 

“ Yes ! I dare say it does. I never have my horses out in 
the morning though.” 

Mrs. Mossenthal never had hers out before luncheon 
either, but to ingratiate herself with Mrs, Cohen, she 
would have ordered them out at midnight. 

“ I will drive you down to Lowndes Square with pleasure, 
if you like. Besides, as you say, I do not know much of 
Miss Levinge, and it would be pleasanter to go with you.” 

Graciously accepting Mrs. MossenthaBs deference as her 
rightful due, Mrs. Cohen made the appointment for the 
morrow, and swept downstairs to where Julia was waiting 
in a charmingly artistic pose on a “Chippendale” hall 
chair of aggressively modern workmanship. 

Mrs. Cohen’s first act on getting home was to find out 
from the pages of Debrett the quantity and quality of Lady 
St. Cyprien’s male belongings. 

Mrs. Mossenthal denied herself to any more callers, and 
spent the rest of the afternoon grubbing out from her ward- 
robe some “ black” in which to pay her condolence visit the 
following day. 


CHAPTER IX 


Twice only, according to Judaic law, did the sun set on 
Ephraim Levinge’s dead body, which almost before the breath 
had left it was laid before an open window. Then when 
the bath and slab of zinc, brought from the Synagogue, had 
been used by those near friends whose duty it was to perform 
the last offices, and when the yolk of an egg had been broken 
over the quiet old face, a rough deal box half filled with saw- 
dust and scantily covered by a meagre strip of black cloth 
was carried into the house. After the fashion of the poor- 
est of his compatriots was the millionaire art-dealer encof- 
fined and borne down the ash-strewn staircase away to that 
vast resting-place of his race, which lies beyond the purlieus 
of the Ghetto. With rents in every garment and crape upon 
her head, Mrs. Marx sat Shivah and wailed for a week, only 
staying her noisy grief to eat largely of the food which cus- 
tom ordains that friends must supply to a house of mourning. 

When the eight days were over, life flowed once more into 
accustomed channels. The pictures which had been turned 
against the walls were restored to their usual positions, and 
the mirrors, into which no face may look when the pale 
angel Azrael has passed through a house, once more reflected 
the light of day. The great business rolled on again, and 
it was as though Ephraim Levinge had never been. 

Just when autumn’s fingers were streaking the great trees 
in the Regent’s Park with orange and gold, Mary Levinge 
settled into her new abode. 

Holmhurst was a big house in the Inner Circle, and all 


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the summer through the perfume of a thousand tropical 
blooms floated across from the Botanical Gardens into the 
windows. A great suite of imposing reception-rooms swept 
in a circle round the marble centre hall. Upstairs were 
Mary's rooms, her bedroom and a boudoir, and the two 
apartments to which Mrs. Marx on arrival at once betook 
herself, and from which she seldom emerged. 

The house was beautifully furnished, with more taste and 
restraint than is generally found in the homes of self-made 
men. The sense of living in a bric-a-brac shop which was 
so evident in Bond Street was wanting at Holmhurst, and 
though the rooms were filled with priceless marquetries, 
pictures, carvings, and statues, they were obviously for 
utility or decoration and not for sale. 

At first, Mary, accustomed to the enforced company which 
is an outcome of living in small rooms, wandered, solitary 
and lost, through the stately apartments of her new home. 
She had deemed herself unaffected by the constant drop- 
ping-in” of clients, business men, and old friends of her 
grandfather, but now she missed the va et vient, the scraps 
of art talk, the town gossip which went on so continuously 
in the overcrowded Bond Street sitting-room. 

Her aunt Judith, freed from parental restraint, now spent 
her days in a half-clothed, somnolent state. She increased 
her subscription to the Yiddisher library in Whitechapel, 
distracted the cook by the eccentricities of her food, and 
received a small but constant stream of visitors, who pre- 
ferred to leave by the back door. 

Of her childhood’s friend, Martin Baird, Mary saw but 
little. He had been left in the onerous position of manager 
of the Art Gallery, and felt that no amount of hard work 
could ever convey the full sense of his responsibilities. 
Sometimes on Friday evenings, the beginning of the Jewish 
Sabbath, he would leave his beloved ledgers and correspond- 


WITHOUT SIN 


81 


ence to dine with Mary. It had been a custom in the days 
of her grandfather, and with the tribal clinging to old ways, 
the girl still wished the habit observed. But do what she 
would with the outward observance of the Friday evenings, 
they were never the same as of old. There were no weav- 
ings of delightful legends, no scraps of unwritten history, 
no marvellous stories of missing jewels or unearthed pic- 
tures. After dinner, Baird, with his ascetic’s face and 
strong hands, would spread out piles of accounts and sheaves 
of papers. 

‘‘ Such and such business had been transacted during the 
past week. It was advisable that so-and-so should be done 
during that to come. He had consulted Mr. Montagu and 
Mr. Mossenthal, the trustees, about this, that, and the 
other,” he would say. 

And Mary, with her delicate eyebrows drawn together 
above her heavy-lidded eyes, and the bow of her mouth 
pressed to a straight line, listened and questioned, and, as 
the details became more familiar, ventured to give direc- 
tions. She was not without the true business capacity of 
her people, which had only lain dormant for want of exer- 
cise. Her slender linger, quaintly ringed with the beaten 
gold band her grandfather had worn for years, traced a way 
with incredible swiftness through endless mazes of accounts, 
and Baird quickly took to relying on her cultivated taste in 
art with respect to the purchases “ Levinge’s” was so often 
expected to make. 

If her social responsibilities had shaped themselves as 
easily as those of business, Mary Levinge would have been 
quite happy. But here her position was rendered difficult by 
the absolute uselessness of Mrs. Marx as either an adviser or 
a chaperon, and by the overwhelming eagerness of some of 
her grandfather’s old friends to fill such positions. Almost 
in the first days of her mourning Mrs. Montagu and Mrs. 

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82 WITHOUT SIN 

Cohen had displayed unaccountable temper— in Mary’s eyes 
—at the kindly hospitality extended to the heiress by Lady 
St. Cyprien. The conversation which had taken place in 
Mrs. Montagu’s astonishing blue-and-gold drawing-room in 
Portland Place, before Mary, who had been invited to 
“ spend the day” there, finally wound up in a covert dispute 
between the matrons as to which of them should godmother 
Mary into society after Lady St. Cyprien had done with 
her. 

“ But I do not want to go into any society, ” had said the 
girl, turning her gentle eyes from Mrs. Cohen’s inflamed 
and angry countenance to Mrs. Montagu’s still pretty 
features. 

“Nonsense! my dear,” retorted Mrs. Cohen. “A girl 
with your fortune cannot help herself. I must see if, in 
consideration of that, you cannot be presented next year. 
I should be only too delighted to launch you in that respect.” 

This was a home thrust at Mrs. Montagu, who in spite 
of her acquaintances among the peerage and her undoubted 
beauty, had never succeeded in getting to Court. 

“ I do not thee that any girl need be prethented till after 
her marriage,” Mrs. Montagu lisped. “The nethethity 
ought to depend on her huthband’s pothition.” 

“I quite agree with you,” said Mrs. Cohen, with inten- 
tion; then, as though it were an after-thought, she added, 
“ but till that time Mary must have some one to take her 
about.” 

Mrs. Montagu was the nearest to Miss Levinge, and 
taking one of her hands, began to pat it. 

“ 1 hope she will never forget that Kothe and Linda are 
her oldeth friendth and that ath their mother I thall 
alwayth be ready to chaperon her ath one of my own 
girlth.” 

“Ah! my dear,” said Mrs. Cohen, with a disagreeable 


WITHOUT SIN 


83 


laugh, “I think you will find two girls quite enough to 
marry off' at a time. You had better leave Mary to me.” 

In a quieter but even more dogged fashion Mrs. Mossen- 
thal had made a bid for the social parentage of the wealthy 
and beautiful Miss Levinge. She pestered the girl to visit 
her at The Rosary, a little place the Mossenthals had among 
the North London hills, and when she refused, paid her long 
calls in Regent’s Park, and harangued her on the ethics of 
housekeeping and sociology as practised by herself. 

The summer and early autumn brought Mary peace, and 
she was free to take solitary drives out to Hampstead, or 
dream the long days away in the fragrant shades of her own 
quiet garden. Only Martin Baird ever disturbed her soli- 
tude, for Lady St. Cyprien was away at Homburg. 

One day in mid-September, when even the pulses of Lon- 
don were still, and the voices of the children playing in the 
Park came languidly through the heavy air, Mary, weary, 
with a vague unrest, of her own grounds, strolled out into 
the Inner Circle and down the road towards the Botanical 
Gardens. She went slowly, and her peculiarly graceful 
walk made her look as though she were gliding along. 

With her grey eyes narrowed to an almond shape between 
her thick white lids, and her mind filled with an old German 
tale she had deciphered that morning from a, rare black- 
letter book Baird had brought her the previous evening, she 
wandered on, till a voice at her side said : 

“ I thought it must be you. Miss Levinge, for I had heard 
from Lady St. Cyprien that you lived about here ; and be- 
sides — nobody moves quite as you do— And yet — I was not 
sure. ” 

It was Dr. Marrable who stood before her, with his glance 
wandering in undisguised surprise over the spotless freshness 
of her white gown. 

“I do not like black,” she said, reading with quick intui- 


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tion the wonder in his eyes. Then went on: “But what 
are you doing in London, Dr. Marrable? I thought the 
whole world was at the sea, or abroad. Were you not 
staying with the St. Cypriens before they went to Hom- 
burg?” 

“ Yes! and that is the root of the reason which brings me 
into the wilds of Regent’s Park to-day. When I left The 
Towers last week I promised Lady St. Cyprien I would 
come and see how you were. She was really disappointed 
at your persistent refusal to go down to her, and has small 
faith in young ladies’ reports of themselves,” he added, 
with a rare smile. 

“ And you have come here just to see me? And you look 
very tired too,” said Mary. “Will you not come in with 
me and have tea in my garden?” 

The invitation was sufficiently unconventional, coming 
from a young girl to a man she scarcely knew, to be start- 
ling; only that Mary, with her pure gaze and child’s mouth, 
could neither be unconventional nor otherwise. 

As Dr. Marrable followed her too slender, white-clad form 
on to the sweeping lawn at the back of Holmhurst, and noted 
the manner in which she gave her orders, and the intelli- 
gence, if not brilliancy, with which she talked to him for 
the next half-hour, he was vaguely conscious that she was 
different from all other women he had met. 

He had known women more beautiful, for, although in 
shape Mary’s face was perfect and free from the rather 
marked peculiarities of her race, the strange fullness above 
the eyes and the undecided colouring of hair and skin were 
undoubted defects. He had known women cleverer, for 
Mary had neither the gift of society small talk nor the trick 
of babbling superficial philosophy. But she had a voice like 
liquid gold, and a mouth that in every curve, expression, 
and slow -shy smile was like that of an angel. 


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85 


When he left, and stepped briskly into the cool of the 
evening down the quiet road, he thought much of her. 

“She’s like none of them,” he muttered to himself. 
“Neither physically nor mentally. But whether she has a 
child’s soul in a woman’s body, or whether her intellect has 
solved a mystery we grosser mortals cannot fathom, I do not 
know. She is neurotic, of course; that seems inevitable 
with a large proportion of the girls of the present generation. 
She is very delicate. But is that all? I hardly know. 
She exhales an atmosphere which attracts and yet repels. 
Her mouth — she has a very lovely mouth— invites anything, 
everything. Her eyes — they are inscrutable eyes — gaze 
beyond you into the unseen. Lady St. Cyprien — bless her 
practical heart — always says the girl is dreaming and a little 
too absorbed in her own sensations and emotions, and that, 
once give her a husband, she will develop into the common- 
sense shrewd woman of her own people.” 

Dr. Marrable’s thoughts had accompanied him as far as 
his own neat doorstep in Harley Street. He drew his latch- 
key from his pocket and inserted it slowly in the keyhole. 

“ That would be a pity. Mary Levinge as she is, is a 
very interesting person.” 

He entered his house briskly and shut the door with a 
bang. 


CHAPTER X 


The electric light blazed with unwinking brilliancy from 
the front windows of Mrs. Mossenthal’s house in Cleveland 
Square. A slight sprinkling of snow chilled the air out- 
side, but within, the tires and lights diffused a heat which 
drew out the acrid odour of the chrysanthemums on the 
mantelpieces and side tables, and intensified the smell of 
rich sauces and soups which rose in steamy wafts from the 
basement. 

Mrs. Mossenthal, gowned in wdiite satin which looked, 
harshly clear against her sallow skin, was standing in the 
middle of her drawing-room buttoning her bony hands and 
heavy rings into her long suede gloves and lecturing her 
husband, who, wearied out with a long day^s golfing in 
Essex, was already showing signs of dropping to sleep 
before the fire. 

Under ordinary circumstances Mrs. Mossenthal treated 
her husbamPs idiosyncrasies with an overt sneer or two, 
but to-night was the occasion of one of her grand Sunday 
dinner-parties, and ’Sac could not be permitted to rumple 
his shirt-front and disarrange his tie so early in the evening. 

“Now ’Sac, for goodness sake, try and keep awake for 
once,” she said in her peevish nasal voice, and wrenching 
viciously at her glove buttons. “ We’ve got a very grand 
party to-night, and I’ve ordered a lovely dinner.” 

“What’s there to eat?” said ’Sac, rousing a little and 
twitching at his collar, which galled him after the day spent 
in the keen December air. 


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87 


Mrs. Mossenthal recited the menu, and then said, “ Don’t 
you want to know who are coining?” 

“Well?” was ’Sac’s indifferent query. 

“All the best people,” returned this wife. “Mrs. Cohen 
will be wild when she hears about it. I would have asked 
her if she hadn’t said once that she thought actors were out 
of place in society. The idea of society without actors and 
celebrities like that.” And quite appalled at the thought 
of such a contingency, she sank — with due regard to her 
skirts — on the edge of a chair. “ But she’ll be sorry when 
she hears that Lady Theo Bellastier is coming.” Mrs. 
Mossenthal glared with her eyes and gave a spasmodic smile 
with her mouth at the prospect of Mrs. Cohen’s discomfiture. 

Mr. Mossenthal started from his slumbrous attitude. 

“ Lady Theo Bellastier ! Why, how did you get hold of 
her?” 

“What a disgusting way you have of putting things,” 
sneered his wife. “ I didn’t get hold of her; I invited her. 
It was the other day when I went to see Mary Levigne, to 
try and persuade her to come to-night; Lady Theo Bellas- 
tier was there, and quite backed me up when I told Mary 
she ought to begin to go out now, and that certainly she 
could come to her own relations. Then, as I had talked so 
much of our dinner-party before Lady Theo, I thought she 
would be hurt if I did not invite her to come. She accepted 
directly, and seemed quite pleased— but, ’Sac, mind you 
make up a card-party after dinner. Lady Theo always ex- 
pects that, wherever she goes ; and you might see that she 
wins— as it’s her first visit. And ’Sac— are you listening? 
You will have to take her down to dinner, and mind you 
don’t call her Lady Bellastier without the Theo ; remember, 
she’s the daughter of a duke.” 

“All right,” said ’Sac good-naturedly. “But who else 
is coming? Is Mary?” 


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“Yes! I gave her no peace till she consented. Then, 
there’s Aubrey Delamere, and the Dick Vanes. I hate that 
Mrs. Vane, she’s the most insolent creature, but ever since 
she found the money for Delamere to take the Frivolity 
Theatre, she insists on seeing all his letters and overlooking 
his engagement list, so one can’t have him without her. 
Then there are the Carlton Wests.” 

“Phew! You’ve made a mistake there, Pay,” said Mr. 
Mossenthal. “Carlton West hates Delamere; he said at 
the Green Room Club last week he loathed other actors. ” 

“ Oh! but he likes swells and I’ve put him the other side 
of Lady Theo, and mind you let him get plenty of chat 
with her. Delamere will sit next me, so they can’t quarrel 
much during dinner. Mrs. West will have Dr. Marrable.” 

“That man coming?” cried ’Sac. “I don’t like him. 
Can’t quite make him out. He doesn’t play golf, and 
always seems to be dangling at the skirts of you women.” 

“Dr. Marrable is not a Jew,” flashed Mrs. Mossenthal 
passionately. “ He knows how to treat ladies properly and 
with consideration. Besides, he goes everywhere now, he’s 
got the biggest practice in London. Please don’t expose 
your ridiculous ideas before other people, or you will only 
be laughed at.” 

Mrs. Mossenthal was lashing herself into one of her tem- 
pers, so ’Sac deemed it best to waive his objections — which 
were really quite mild — to Dr. Marrable, and profess 
interest in the remainder of his guests. 

•‘Well! Who else?” 

“ The Tauntons. We owe them a dinner, you know, and 
she always looks smart, though goodness knows how she 
pays for those gowns of her. The Leonard Greenfields, 
they’re going to have a house at Maidenhead next summer, 
and 1 want to be asked there. Claude and Oscar Vanstone, 
one must have plenty of men, you know — and for the 


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89 


first time Mrs. Mossenthal paused in her high-voiced chatter 
and glanced sideways at her husband. 

“Miss Vere Marindin — ” 

“What!” cried Mossenthal, springing from his chair and 
pulling his squat form into some semblance of dignity. 

“Oh! you needn’t fly in a rage,” said Mrs. Mossenthal, 
in her iciest manner, and preparing for war. “ I know you 
don’t like the girl, because that old gossip, Levi Simmons, 
told you something against her.” 

“She’s a horrid woman. Smokes cigarettes before the 
servants, and tells stories — stories like a man.” 

“More shame for the men then,” snapped Mrs. Mossen- 
thal, with a fine, if somewhat inconsequential scorn. “ But 
Vere Marindin is a celebrity. She paints lovely pictures, 
I’m sure, and I know Lady Theo Bellastier will like her 
immensely.” 

“ Well, I won’t have her introduced to Mary, mind that.” 
For once ’Sac Mossenthal spoke with decision. Good- 
natured and easy-going to a fault, he yet had all the Jew’s 
strict notions with regard to his own womankind. Women 
were of course inferior beings, born for the service and the 
pleasure of man, but al ways to be shielded from harm, even 
as a valuable chattel should be preserved from injury. 

Mrs. Mossenthal muttered something about “ the fuss that 
every one made of Mary,” but knew from experience that 
her husband’s foot was down. 

“ Bertie Chant is coming of course. It will be such a 
grand party for him to write about in the papers.” 

And then, with her artificial smile and stiff-jointed walk, 
she moved forward to greet the first of her guests. 

The dinnner went off charmingly. Mr. Delamere and 
Mr. Carlton West — whom no woman with a shadow of tact 
would have ever invited to sit at the same table — were con- 
tent with mutually glaring at one another j Miss Vere Ma- 


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rindin confined her pungent conversation to lier immediate 
neighbours; Mrs. Dick Vane did not audibly criticise the 
decorations, the guests, or the dinner, and ^Sac Mossenthal 
did not go to sleep once. 

When finally Mrs. Mossenthal caught Lady Theo Bellas- 
tier's eye, and the ladies rustled and fluttered upstairs, she 
felt all the elation of success, which was, however a little 
damped by the true 7nauvais (juarf dUienre of a hostess’s 
evening, namely the period which marks the social sepa- 
ation of the sexes. 

Mrs. Dick Vane, smarting under the sense that Aubrey 
Delamere had been placed next Mary Levinge, and had 
payed her effusive attention all during dinner, crumpled the 
first rose-leaf, by remarking aloud on the somewhat vague 
style of art which prevailed in her hostess’s drawing-room. 
Mrs. Carlton West and Mrs. Taunton at first joined issue in 
decrying the taste of modern decorators in general, and the 
tradesman who had designed Mrs. Mossenthal’s rooms in 
particular, until they started a difference of their own con- 
cerning the merits of their respective dressmakers. Miss 
Vere Marindin introduced herself to Mary Levinge, while 
Lady Theo Bellastier betook herself to the open card-table, 
and set herself a solitary and intricate game of patience. 

Mrs. Mossenthal’s annoyance was making itself unpleas- 
antly visible round her thin mouth and hard eyes, when, 
with the subdued roar of many voices, the big white folding 
doors were flung open and the tobacco-scented, black-coated 
flood of men poured into the room. 

The women, with charming smiles on their faces, drew 
their skirts into a smaller space and revealed unknown pos- 
sibilities in the shape of seating accommodation. 

In the general movement that filled the large room for 
some minutes. Dr. Marrable found himself standing by 
Mary Levinge, and looked down at her. 


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91 


She was as usual in a white gown untouched by any 
colour — the spotless white of deep mourning. Where it 
was cut away from her throat and arms it showed the trans- 
parent, tine skin of a child, but with the modesty which is 
so developed in some Jewesses, her bodice was not low, and 
the birth of her breasts was hidden beneath the jealous silk. 
The thick strands of her hair gleamed like pale gold under 
the raw electric light, but her face was pale and bistre 
shadows ringed her eyes. 

“ You are not well to-night,’’ said Marrable, after gazing 
at her for a moment. “ Y'ou look quite changed from what, 
you did when I saw you last — in September, was it not?” 

•• [ think I am quite well. Dr. Marrable,” answered Mary 
with directness. 

“And I think you are not. Miss Levinge,” said Marrable. 

She smiled faintly. 

“ This is the tirst time I have been out since — my mourn- 
ing. I did not want to come, but Mrs. Mossenthal seemed 
to wish it so particularly, and Lady Theo said I ought to 
— and — so ” 

It struck Marrable how full of self-abnegation her simple 
words were, and he wondered if she differed from others of 
her sex in their supreme devotion to themselves. 

“ And how do you like us all now you have come out of 
your shell?” he said, half teasingly. 

xMary shot him a little glance, but did not speak. 

Marrable looked round the room to find her true answer. 
’Sac Mossenthal, his good-natured swarthy face greasy with 
heat and flushed with wine, was leering boorishly at Lady 
Theo, who, with the delicious whiteness of her beautiful 
figure lavishly displayed, was sprawling half across the card- 
table, and with her cjamine^a mouth wide open was screamr 
ing at some pungent witticism of Miss Vere Marindin’s. 
Mrs. Dickie Vane, with tears of rage in her eyes and anger 


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quivering in her voice, was alternately inuttering coniniands 
and entreaties to Mr. Aubrey Delamere on the subject of 
his leading lady. 

Mr. Carlton West was expounding the subtleties of his 
own reading of Hamlet to little Mrs. Taunton, who opnely 
yawned in his face and said “ Yes” and “No” in the wrong 
place, while she wondered whether her husband would re- 
member to be polite to the Greenfields, who were big City 
people. 

“I am afraid you won’t like us — much,” said Marrable, 
as a burst of noisy laughter broke from the “ cosy corner’? 
where Mrs. West, Mrs. Mossenthal, and Bertie Chant had 
their heads very close together. 

“ It is my fault, ” answered the girl, a little wearily. “ I 
am not used to society yet. I dare say I shall like it one 
day.” 

Marrable glanced to where Lady Theo’s naked shoulders 
gleamed like polished ivory beneath the wicked eyes of 
Vere Marindin; to where Mrs. Vane, her point gained with 
hev protefje, grinned and grimaced with the sense of grati- 
fied power; to where Mrs. Mossenthal, her sallow, cold 
face quick with malice, retailed salacious gossip to the group 
gathered round her. 

“ Does Lady St. Cyprien know you are here to-night?” 
asked Marrable presently. He had sunk into the lounge at 
Mary’s side, and was too physically comfortable to move 
away from the silent girl in search of a more amusing 
companion. 

“ Oh, yes ; I tell her everything. She is my dearest — 
almost my dearest friend.” 

“ So I always understood. But may I ask. Miss Levinge, 
with the privilege of an old friend of almost your dearest 
friend, who stands before Lady St. Cyprien in your 
affections?” 


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93 


Mary blushed a little, as a child does who guards a 
precious secret. 

‘’I would rather not tell you, Dr. Marrable; you would 
only laugh at me.” 

“Now, Lady Bellastier,” cried’ Sac Mossenthal, forgetting 
his lesson on social etiquette in the exuberant prospect of a 
game of cards j “what’s it to be? Nap, chemin defer, or 
real baccarat?” 

“ Baccarat’s good enough for me,” said her ladyship, pull- 
ing her chair up to the table and preparing for action. 

“Come on, you fellows! Come, Marrable, and have a 
flutter. Greenfield, put up the bank. Now, Taunton. 
Come on, Delamere; the ladies can talk to each other.” 

But Mr. Mossenthal got such a furious look from his wife 
that he hastened to amend such an Oriental sentiment, and 
added roughly : 

“Except those who want to play, of course.” 

Three minutes later Mary was alone. Every one save 
Mrs. Mossenthal and Mrs. Vane, who had united in abusing 
a mutual friend, was gathered round the card-table. The 
girl felt frightfully lonely in the big white drawing-room 
with its score of electric lamps that stared like big yellow 
eyes. Every burst of laughter from the noisy card-players 
seemed to thrust her further away. 

Why had they invited her here only to exile her, like some 
naughty child, to a corner? Why had they not left her in 
her home, which she was growing to love so well, where she 
spent such happy evenings with her books and her thoughts, 
and always the unfathomable sweet eyes of her dear picture? 

A childish anger against these people who would not 
leave her in peace, and who openly neglected her when they 
had gained their ends, filled her heart. The garish room, 
with its distant, motley group, was blotted and blurred by 
the hot tears which forced themselves into her eyes. The 


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chink of money and the babble of noisy laughter grew like 
the thick sound of muffled waves in her ears. Only Vere 
Marindin’s fluty voice asking Bertie Chant for a light struck 
sharply through the confused roar. She tried to move, but 
something swayed beneath her feet; she tried to cry aloud, 
but a knot in her throat strangled her. 

“Mary, come upstairs with me.’’ 

Mrs. Mossenthal’s large cool hand and thin, icy voice 
roused her, and she struggled to her feet and followed her 
hostess from the room. 

Once upstairs, Mrs. Mossenthal rang for her maid, and 
sent downstairs for Dr. Marrable. 

“ Miss Levinge is a little faint. I suppose the room was 
too hot,” said Mrs. Mossenthal, as Dr. Marrable entered 
her bedroom, where, in a large armchair, Mary lay white 
and silent. Then she whispered, in a stage aside: “Not 
too much sympathy ; she is subject to these attacks, I fancy, 
and one has to be so firm with young girls.” 

Marrable nodded and passed her. Then took the girl’s 
hand and laid his firm fingers on her wrist. 

“ Miss Levinge is merely a little overdone. She had better 
go home; in fact, I will take her and knock up a chemist 
e)i route.''’ 

Mrs. Mossenthal’s brows frowned ominously. She did 
not care to have one of her principal guests carried off by a 
chit of a girl, even though she was a big heiress. But Mar- 
rable, with his infinite knowledge of the eternal feminine, 
smoothed matters over by saying : 

“ 1 will just give Miss Levinge into the care of her maid, 
and shall be back here in half-an-hour.” Then, as he passed 
out with Mary on his arm, he said to his hostess ; “ I must 
come back; I have had no chat with you yet.” 

The distance from Cleveland Square to Regent’s Park 
was not great; but the cool air and cushioned quietness of 


WITHOUT SIN 


95 


her brougham quickly restored Mary, and she was almost 
herself as she descended at her own door and gave Marrable 
her hand. 

“ Thank you for taking so much trouble, Dr. Marrable, 
and I will take the draught at once, and go to see you to- 
morrow morning. Make my apologies to Lady Theo for 
being so stupid — and, again, thank you.” 

Then the heavy door shut on her pale face, and sad, heavy 
eyes, and Marrable drove back in her carriage, as she had 
wished, to Cleveland Square. 

It was the chill December dawn before the sleepy cabmen 
ranked in front of the MossenthaTs door were hailed by 
their fares. Lady Theo, ugly with fatigue and jubilant 
with success, was the first to go. 

“Ask me again soon,” she screamed out of the darkness, 
as her hansom turned the corner of the Square. 

Marrable and Bertie Chant left the last, and Mrs. Mos- 
senthal, with her white feather fan outspread upon her 
chest, stood on the doorstep to bid them good-bye. 

“Then it’s quite settled that Bertie and Vere Marindin 
and I dine with you to-morrow, doctor, and go to a play 
afterwards? Good-night,” she called, into the cold dawn. 

“What a charming party it has been,” said Mrs. 
Mossenthal, as she unpinned her back hair. 

“Why? Because you’ve got a dinner and a play out 
of it for nothing?” said Mr. Mossenthal with brutal frank- 
ness, as he rolled into bed and turned on one side. 

“’Sac, you are a brute,” retorted Mrs. Mosenthal. 


CHAPTEK XI 


Four persons were gathered in Lady St. Cyprien’s bou- 
doir in Lowndes Square. The dusk of the winter after- 
noon was falling fast, but the fire flames dancing on the 
wide hearth struck at housand sparkling reflections from the 
quaint blue Dutch tiles and polished brass dogs. 

“ Ah, it is good to be here, ” sighed Dr. Marrable, who, 
with an unusual air of self-indulgence, was lounging in the 
full warmth of the hot red logs. ‘‘ But, Lady St. Cyprien, 
promise to turn me out at five. It is a great nuisance, only 
I have such a string of people to see between then and 
dinner-time.” 

Lady St. Cyprien lifted her dark eyes from the fleecy 
work which occupied her fingers, and smiled across at 
Marrable. 

“You are no better than the rest of us, then?” she said, 
with a quiet smile. “Koses and raptures have some 
attraction for you after all, anchorite though you profess 
to be.” 

“Nonsense!” broke in Lady Theo Bellastier, who was 
making a remarkable display of scarlet silk flounces and 
very dainty hottines to the fire. “Noel is no anchorite. 
Are you, my friend? Those who judge you so see only the 
surface, the consulting-room and sick-bedside view. Now 
I have known you — for how long?” 

She lazily turned her head in the depths of a huge down 
pillow, and looked at him saiuTily from under her lashes. 

“Your ladyship was just fourteen when I first attended 


WITHOUT SIN 97 

your mother, the Duchess,’’ said Marrable with exaggerated 
politeness. 

So I was, and riding the gees barebacked in the pad- 
dock, and setting booby-traps for all my father’s guests. Do 
you remember what particular form yours took?” 

“A boot- jack.” 

“Ah ha!” pealed Lady Theo, at the recollection. “And 
you threatened to catch and kiss me it I ever played you 
such a trick again. Oh, dear, what idiots some women — 
your patients— are, not to suspect that somewhere about you 
there are hidden depths. Shall I enlighten them, Noel?” 

With the grin of a mischievous child, Lady Theo tossed 
her smoked-out cigarette into the heart of the fire. 

“ Shall I tell them,” she went on in a teasing way, “that 
you are a man who ?” 

“For heaven’s sake, don’t,” broke in Lord Stansdale, 
who till then had been content to listen to the ripple of 
chat and the whisper of the fluttering flames, from the 
depths of his armchair next to Lady St. Cyprien. “ Why, 
if every woman did not think that she were destined to 
p’ay the all-conquering Delilah to this invincible Samson, 
where would his practice be?” 

Marrable laughed as he said: “Thanks, Stansdale, for 
your tribute to my professional skill.” 

‘•But, seriously, Noel,” said the Countess, “do you not 
know that among the scores of women who fill your wait- 
ing-rooms every morning, there is always an air, intangible, 
vague, imperceptible, save to other women, of expectation? 
Every woman as she is shown into your waiting-room is 
regarded by those already there as a possible rival.” 

“ A rival ! In what?” cried Marrable, crossing Lady St. 
Cyprien’ s gentle voice with his own suave tones. 

“In your affections, ” said Lady St. Cyprien, laying aside 
her work and preparing to face the situation, 

7 


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“ My affections ! Good heavens ! What on earth do the 
women want with a man like me? I am very plain.’’ 
Marrable spoke with a brutal frankness, which commended 
itself to Lady Theo, for she said in her most decisive 
manner : 

So am I. Quite ugly, in fact; but that has never 
prevented me from having plenty of admirers. Now, you 
are ugly too, my dear doctor, but you are a bachelor, 
reported rich, and an accredited misogynist. Don’t you 
know that such a reputation is sufficient to make my 
impressionable sex wild to catch you?” 

“Theo, please don’t interrupt,” said Lady St. Cyprien. 
“ We are discussing Noel and his would-be admirers. 
Now, I mean to lecture him on a side issue of the ques- 
tion.” She faced round towards Marrable. 

“Noel, why don’t you marry?” 

“Marry!” he cried, while every one laughed at the 
intensity with which he had been addressed. 

“ Stansdale answered your question before it was asked, 
my dear Lady St. Cyprien. What would become of my 
practice?” 

“ But you would enlarge it among families who now do 
not go to you because you are a bachelor. So many people 
hold that a doctor should be a married man.” 

Marrable shook his head. 

“ My dear Lady St. Cyprien, my patients, to let you into 
a secret, are mainly women with money to spare and time 
to waste. It amuses them to pass the morning in my 
waiting-rooms. Now I will tell you something. You and 
the women of your order who come to me are my genuine 
patients. You come for certain reasons, and are not likely 
to have ulterior motives.” 

Here Lady Theo shrugged her expressive shoulders and 
made a face. 


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99 


“ Oh ! I am not going to preach the righteousness of the 
upper classes, Lady Theo. I am simply not the kind of 
man they notice. If I married to-morrow not one of my 
‘swell’ patients would leave me; for, though as a doctor I 
may be fashionable, as a man I am not worthy of a second 
thought.” 

He implied no sneer in his manner of speech. He knew 
the women of his age too well to do more than comment on 
their foibles. 

“ Hut the difference would be in that great wealthy, 
virtuous middle class.” 

He turned to Lady Theo. 

“ You were at Mrs. Mossenthal’s on Sunday night. You 
saw the women who were there, the wives and daughters 
of professional and business men. They are all patients of 
mine, and they come to me for two reasons — first, because 
they can rub shoulders with you and your order in my 
rooms and on my staircase. It is the same instinct which 
takes these Bayswater and Kensington maids and matrons, 
and vulgar City folk to Hurlingham and Sandown, to Ascot 
and the Park on Sunday. They flock in shoals to fashion- 
able weddings and such semi-public functions, that they 
may gossip afterwards of a countess’s gowns or a duchess’s 
diamonds.” 

“ How pleased Mrs. Mossenthal would be if she could 
hear you,” murmured Lady Theo. 

“ Mrs. Mossenthal is of the type I mean. Vain, selfish, 
and silly ; satisfied in her ignorant craving for smart society 
if she can boast that she has recognised Lady St. Cyprien 
in the Park, or has lost her money to you, Lady Theo, over 
the card-table; gratified still more in her vanity, if I— or 
any other man, for that matter— look into her eyes or hold 
her hand for mie second longer than \z necessary. Mrs. 
Mossenthal, and scores of women of her mental calibre and 


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social standing, would take her megrims and her guineas 
elsewhere to-morrow if I married.” 

“Of course Mrs. Mossenthal is a very commonplace 
person; and I do not think, dear Theo, you should go to 
her house; but from what I have seen of her — in your 
rooms, Noel, and at Mary’s sometimes — I should at least 
have given her the credit of being rather a strict person. 
She has such a stiff, cold air about her.” 

Marrable laughed. 

“My dear Lady St. Cyprien, the painful stiffness and 
gauche shyness of so many women of the Mossenthal type 
come merely from their inborn provincialism, and from the 
fact that in past generations the strict middle-class men 
prevented their womankind from mixing with the world at 
all. But that coldness you find, characterises their inter- 
course with both sexes, and is not therefore the result of 
excessive modesty — it is merely superficial. The women 
of the wealthy middle classes are immoral to a degree, and, 
as a rule, without the excuse of either passion or affection. 
They will permit and join in conversation of the coarsest 
kind, and the bulk of them are illiterate and ignorant, 
although you of other ranks have an idle trick of attribut- 
ing all the virtues and accomplishments to them. No one 
can deny, or wishes to deny, that most of the world’s art 
since the beginning of the Christian era has sprung from 
the brains of the great Jewish race of the lower orders; 
but such cases are mere psychological phenomena, other 
forms of the neurosis which is slowly but surely sapping all 
civilised humanity.” 

Five chimed from a silver clock. 

“ Ah ! I must be going, ” said Marrable, drawing himself 
from the depths of his chair. “ I have to see Miss Levinge 
first. Your little protegee is a charming child ; but it’s a pity 
she has not more nervous self-control — more moral fibre.” 


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101 


^‘Surely, Noel,’’ said Lady St. Cyprian, warmly. ‘‘You 
would not class Mary Levinge among the Mrs. Mossenthals, 
and such people.” 

“There are exceptions to every rule,” he said, gravely, 
as he bent over her hand. 

Tea and the lights came as Dr. Marrable left the room, 
and silence reigned while the servants were present. 
When the three were alone once move Lord Stansdale was 
the first to break the silence. 

“ Is Miss Levinge really very delicate. Aunt Adela?” 

Lady St. Cyprien shot a keen glance from her dark eyes 
at her nephew before she answered. 

“No, my dear boy, not more so than hundreds of girls of 
her age. She is rather nervous, and fanciful, and anaemic. 
I shall take her to Royat-les-Bains next July, think.” 

“ Unless ” drawled Lady Theo, with a suggestive 

little moue. 

“ Unless she should be married, you mean?” 

Lady Theo had her mouth full of muffin, so nodded an 
assent. 

“I do not think that Mary is in any hurry to marry,” 
said Lady St. Cyprien, speaking very quietly and with 
some emphasis. “ She has already, I believe, definitely 
refused the son of some people called Montagu, who live in 
Portland Place.” 

Stansdale flushed indignantly all over his handsome 
young face. 

“ You don’t mean to say that that idiot, Lionel Montagu, 
the son of Ben Montagu, the money-lender, has dared to 
propose to the girl?” he cried, with heat. 

“ I don’t know if the young man spoke to Mary himself, 
for she is very shy of talking of such things. But she told 
me she could gc to the Montagus’ no more, because they 
were vexed with her, and 1 gathered the rest.” 


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Lady Theo’s sharp eyes had wandered from Lady St. 
Cyprien’s face to Lord Stansdale and back again. Sud- 
denly she set down her tea-cup with a decided clatter, and 
said, with an apparently indifferent air : 

“ And, pray, is not a young Jew good enough for Mary 
Levinge to marry?” 

“Not a Lionel Montagu,” cried Stansdale, indignantly, 
“he is three parts crazy.” 

“ Besides, I feel sure that in her choice of a husband 
Mary will be guided by her own heart,” said the Countess, 
quietly. 

An hour later. Lady Theo said, with many yawns and 
stretchings of her limbs, that she must be going. 

“Theo,” said Lady St. Cyprien, as she kissed her at the 
head of the stairs, “don’t tease about Mary Levinge before 
Stansdale. You know he is deeply attached to her.” 

“Not really?” cried Lady Theo, with well-affected sur- 
prise. “ But do you — would Lord St. Cyprien ?” 

“We should be delighted. Stansdale is not rich, as you 
know, and Mary’s money would be useful; but, apart from 
that, her beautiful nature, her modest ways, her sweetness 
and purity, have endeared her to us inexpressibly. Of 
course I know there will be an outcry in society; but I 
intend to have her with me a good deal now, and people so 
soon forget things. Besides, Stansdale is rather old- 
fashioned in his ideas, and will never marry a girl from 
among our own set, who has had her affaires de cceur, her 
lovers’ quarrels and reconciliations, and endless escapades, 
from the time she was in short frocks.” 

Little Lady Theo, with her fascinatingly ugly face and 
her pretty figure, winked with both her eyes as she tripped 
downstairs, and thought of her own girlhood. 


CHAPTER XII 


The spring was early and the Park in March had quite 
an air of first summer days. Even Mrs. Marx, chilly and 
slow -blooded from sheer inanition, loosened the heavy furs 
about her throat and said to Mary, as the victoria dashed 
down the wide road that leads from the Marble Arch to 
Piccadilly, “ It is a fine day 

Mary nodded. She was looking unusually pretty. The 
wooing breaths of the new-born season had urged her 
virgin blood to a warmer course, and touched the pale oval 
of her face with a flush of love for life. Even the calm 
depths of her light almond eyes were stirred, and danced 
with the baby leaves upon the trees. Nature’s great heart 
throbbed in her veins and almost woke her from her life- 
long Galatea sleep. 

“There’s Miss Levinge’s carriage,” said Eugene Cohen 
to his mother as Mary’s smart equipage pulled up in the 
sunshine at the end of the Row. “ How well she looks to- 
day ! I never saw anybody vary so much. Sometimes she 
would pass for an ugly girl if it weren’t that her features 
were so good.” 

“Young girls never look alike two days together,” said 
Mrs. Cohen, whose pronounced appearance presented as 
little variation from month to month as the surface of a 
stone wall. 

Mrs. Cohen and her son occupied two chairs in the front 
of the morning parade ground. Eugene did not often 
escort his mother into public, and in honour of such an 


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event she had arrayed herself in an elaborate and very tight 
costume of black velvet, in which she was already too 
warm. 

Eugene Cohen was an accurate type of the young Jew 
who goes into “Society.” His black hair, which was kept 
scrupulously short at the back, still retained, despite 
cosmetics and continued brushing, a strong “ kink” above 
the forehead and at the sides. His dark skin was brightly 
touched with red on the cheeks and lips. His eyes, like 
his mother’s, were full and handsome, but the coarse nose 
and unmistakable twang in the speech discounted his better 
features. His clothes, of which he seemed to have an ever- 
varying wardrobe, were always too new, the tailor’s folds 
were too conspicuous, and the padding on the shoulders too 
obvious. He never wore a pair of gloves twice, and dis- 
carded his boots and ties wholesale. Of Bohemian clubs 
and theatrical dances he was an acknowledged supporter. 
Without his presence on Saturday at supper or Sunday at 
dinner, the Savoy restaurant would scarcely have known 
itself. He had a complete “ by sight” acquaintance with 
the entire peerage, had raced a little, gambled a good deal, 
and was now lying fallow preparatory to making a good 
marriage. 

His little gallantries with Mrs. Montagu had effectually 
spoiled his chances with the daughters of the house of 
Eaffstein— the aristocrats of the London Jews — and an 
ordinary Bayswater heiress would scarcely have suited 
either him or his mother. Mary Levin ge had been impos- 
sible so long as her grandfather had been alive, but with 
the old man dead, and his money-bags bequeathed to the 
girl, the match seemed commendable to Eugene. So much 
was it in his thoughts that almost unconsciously he said, 
“ If she were my wife T should have Baird’s name put over 
the place in Bond Street, take her away to Paris for a year 


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105 


to give her style, then have her presented at Court, live in 
Mayfair, and cut every Jew in London.” 

Mr. Eugene Cohen smiled broadly and boastfully as he 
spoke of the parent race. He was one of the renegade 
Hebrews, who in their hearts loathe their own people, who 
are more anti- Jewish than the most fanatical Christian, 
who would change their names with their coats, and would 
give of their beloved gold to rid themselves of their tribal 
attributes. If there was one more potent charm about 
Mary Levin ge, in Mr. Cohen’s fine dark eyes, than her 
wealth, it was her singular dissimilarity to the Jewish race. 
She would pass anywhere for a thoroughbred Gentile. 

“Mary does look quite sweet to-day,” Mrs. Cohen said 
presently, with a side-glance fixed on Eugene’s face. “ I’m 
not sure that habit of hers of always wearing white is not 
rather distinguished.” 

“It’s peculiar enough, if that’s what you mean, but not 
at all good form. You never heard of one of the really 
great ladies sticking to one particular colour or style ; they 
wear anything and everything. It is a rather provincial 
taste in Mary, being what she is. Of course if she were 
another kind of person it would be all right. She’d be 
called La Dame Blanche, and be quite a celebrity on the 
strength of the fad.” 

Mrs. Cohen smiled approvingly. Queen of Bayswater 
though she was, her kingdom was bounded by Portland 
Place, and she always — in private— gave her son the pas in 
matters of sociology. 

“Don’t you think you had better go and speak to her? 
There, she is looking this way and sees us. Wait a 
minute, Eugene, not so fast; I think I will come with 
you.” 

“What a perfect day!” said Mary presently, look- 
ing with longing eyes down the pale green alleys of tin* 


106 


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Park. “ Aunt Judith, do come for a stroll. It will do you 
good. 

But Aunt Judith rolled out a guttural protest, and 
Mary’s face fell. 

Mrs. Cohen felt that the psychological moment had 
arrived. ‘‘ Eugene, take Miss Levinge for a little walk. I 
will stay and talk to Mrs. Marx till you come back.” 

With elaobrate politeness and much bowing of Mr. 
Eugene Cohen’s full-grown body upon his undersized legs 
— for he did not only favour his people in his face and 
speech — Mary was handed from her carriage, and her place 
filled with Mrs. Cohen’s massive frame. 

When she had once seen the young people started on 
their stroll down the Row, Mrs. Cohen raised her parasol, 
offered up a prayer that none of her friends would see her 
sitting alongside Mrs. Marx, and knowing that her com- 
panion was no conversationalist, prepared to go to sleep 
with her eyes open. 

“That’s the Duke of Grandchester on that chestnut over 
there; and Lord Poulteney, with Lady Betty Wexford, 
whom he’s going to marry next week, are with him,” began 
Eugene in his best manner. 

“Oh, yes!” said Mary, nodding and smiling at the 
group, who returned her salute. “I know them quite 
well.” Then seeing a momentary astonishment creep over 
Eugene’s face, she added very simply, “They came to the 
Art Gallery, you know. The Duke was my grandfather’s 
first customer, and they became great friends. As to Lady 
Betty, she came one day when she was about ten, with her 
mother, the Countess of Bray, and began playing about till 
she broke a Dresden vase, one of a pair. I remember how 
angry grandfather was, and the Countess boxed Lady 
Betty’s ears. She and I were laughing about it all, the 
other day, at Lady St. Cyprien’s.” 


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107 


Mary spoke with such straiglitforward candour that it 
was impossible to believe she was making any display of her 
acquaintanceship with the salt of the earth. Eugene, how- 
ever, considered it better for the moment to cease pointing 
out smart people to his companion, but rather to assume the 
knowledge she evidently possessed. 

“You see a great deal of Lady St. Cyprien, don’t you?” 
he asked, settling his shoulders in the padding of his coat, 
and trying to set his short rolling gait to the girl’s gliding 
walk. “She’s an awfully nice sort of woman.” 

“ Do you know her?” queried Mary, raising her arched 
brows in astonishment. 

“ Oh, no, I don’t know her, but — I know a lot of fellows 
who do, and they all say she’s awfully jolly.” 

“ I think your friends must be thinking of some one else. 
Lady St. Cyprien is the dearest, most perfectly sympathetic 
woman in the world, but she is not what most people would 
call ‘jolly.’” 

“Oh! well, you know what I mean. Miss Levinge,” said 
Eugene, thinking that he would have to correct this tendency 
to hyper-precision in his wife. “We all know what we 
mean, but gentlemen can’t always express themselves with 
the same particularity as you ladies.” 

Eugene Cohen, in spite of his knowledge of manners and 
things, had never overcome the vulgarity which lies in the 
misuse of the words “gentleman” and “lady.” 

“ That seems rather a pity,” said Mary, and then the con- 
versation, which had been but a poor thing at the beginning, 
languished and died. 

Mary’s lithe young limbs moved quickly, and already the 
far end of the Row, where a great bosquet of budding lilacs 
and laburnums hid Kensington Gardens from view, was in 
sight. 

Eugene Cohen knew perfectly well the task he had to 


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accomplish before he and Mary returned to the carriage. 
It was not a light one, for the girl gave him no encourage- 
ment; in fact, she seemed oblivious of his presence. 

She had lowered her parasol and was swinging it lightly 
from two hiigers as she paced along. Her gaze was fixed 
on the distant clump of bushes, her slightly parted lips 
indicated deep thought. 

“Are you going to the Montagu’s dance next week?” he 
said, suddenly determined to break the silence and trust to 
chance to give him a lead. 

To his astonishment a swift blush stained the pale fair- 
ness of her skin. Then he thought he saw his mistake. 

“I beg your pardon, I am sure,” he said, twanging his 
words a little more than usual in his confusion. “I forgot 
your mourning. Seeing you always in white, one forgets.” 

“It is not that,” said Mary, turning honest, clear eyes 
towards him, though the blush still lingered in her cheeks. 
“Mrs. Montagu has not invited me. She is very angry 
with me.” 

It was Eugene’s turn to change colour now. A red light 
flashed into his bright brown eyes, and his straight white 
teeth set on his lower lip. 

Was it possible that Mrs. Montagu was going to play the 
jealous mistress; was going to interfere with his settlement 
in life, because of half-a-dozen stolen meetings, and a few 
furtive hand-clasps? This slip of a woman, with her bounc- 
ing grown-up daughters, could not hope to retain for ever 
the greenhorn admiration of a man young enough to be her 
son-in-law. She nuist surel}^ be mad, to risk a scandal 
after so many years, by making an open rupture with the 
girl who was for the moment the acknowledged catch of the 
Jewish community. If the affair leaked out, how furious 
his mother would be ! It would end in society — t/ieir society, 
dividing into two camps- and then how the Christians would 


WITHOUT SIN 


109 


laugh — and at the thought of affording amusement to the 
Christian, the Jew -hater writhed. 

“ Yes! Mrs. Montagu is dreadfully cross with me,” went 
on Mary, in a slightly tremulous voice. “ She has even 
forbidden Rose and Linda to come to see me.” 

She walked precisely to the railing at the end of the Row, 
touched it with her hand as a child playing a game might 
have done, then turned to walk back. 

“ Do you know — do you guess any reason?” mumbled 
Eugene, still very red in the face. 

I — I — think — I think, I am almost sure I do,” said 
Mary, lowering her long dark lashes and slackening her 
swift steps. 

“ What is it?” cried Eugene, forgetting his veneer of fine 
manners in his anxiety to know the worst. 

“ I don’t think I ought to tell you,” said Mary, blushing 
again, and looking very pretty and very shy. 

“ It must be something to do with me, or the girl would 
never look like that. Damn Mrs. Montagu and her spite- 
ful Rortugee ways,” thought Eugene to himself. Then, 
feeling that nothing but a brave front would avert a world 
of troubles, he cried, with a fervour that savoured of the 
theatrical : 

‘‘Then you believe the calumny. Miss Levinge. You 
lend your ears to every idle tale that an envious, tattling 
world brings to your door. Because, for some silly whim, 
a woman such as Mrs. Montagu does not ask you to her 
house, you accept, without a word, insinuations against me?” 

Mary stopped short in the centre of the path. 

“Mr. Cohen! what are you talking about? How can it 
concern you, or your good name, whether I am invited to 
Mrs. Montagu’s house or not ? Since you have elected to 
make a mountain out of a molehill, I may tell you that I 
believe she is vexed because ” 


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Because 

“ Because, some months ago, when Mrs. Montagu did me 
the honour to wish me to be her daughter-in-law, 1 de- 
clined.” 

“You declined?” cried Eugene, between one gasp of 
relief and another of hope. 

Mary saw no reason to repeat her words and walked on. 

“May I — Miss Levinge — may I ask why?” murmured 
Eugene in her ear, for the danger being overpast, he 
assumed once more his most impressive society air. 

“ I do not like Lionel Montagu, ” said Mary, walking very 
quickly towards the upper end of the Kow, whence already 
the crowd of promenaders was dispersing itself in black 
patches, which marred the fresh young green of the springing 
grass. 

“No other reason at all? Are you sure?” persisted 
Eugene. 

“What other reason could I have? Surely, Mr. Lionel 
Montagu is reason enough in himself,” said Mary tersely. 

“ There was no whisper of love in your heart for another?” 

Eugene quoted from a play in which he had recently 
performed the amorous hero. 

“I don^t understand you, Mr. Cohen,” said Mary, in 
rather a nervous way. The purest and most innocent of 
woman have the instinct of sex prudery aroused by a 
threatened proposal. 

“Have you ever cared for any one else?” whispered her 
persistent wooer. 

The girl’s pride drove the blood into her cheeks. 

“ Mr. Cohen, I am not a woman who will ever give her 
heart unsought.” 

Eugene smiled, such a conventional beginning must 
surely argue the desired ending. 

“ But if I sought your heart?” he asked hurriedly, for 


WITHOUT SIN 


111 


they were rapidly nearing Albert Gate, and to propose amid 
a grating of chairs and crowds of shifting people would only 
be absurd. “ If I told you that 1 loved you, have loved you 
for some time past, would you give me your heart then?” 

Mary had turned very pale, almost livid, beneath the 
shadow of her hat. She did not speak, but shook her head. 

“ Of course 1 mean, would you be my wife?” said Eugene, 
sticking with characteristic tenacity to his purpose. “ My 
mother will welcome you as a daughter; you know how fond 
she is of you. Miss Levinge — do not walk so fast — I want 
to tell you that I love you, more than I ever thought I 
should. I ” 

am much obliged, but I cannot possibly marry you,” 
came from beneath Mary’s sunshade. 

“ But surely this is not final. Let me call and plead my 
cause.” 

‘‘Nothing will make me alter my mind.” 

And then Miss Levinge did an undignified thing. She 
positively ran the last hundred yards of the Row and pre- 
sented herself pale, agitated, and breathless before her Aunt 
Judith and Mrs. Cohen. 

The latter saw at a glance that her son’s suit had not 
prospered, but she, too, never knew when she was beaten. 

“ I shall drive round to see you this afternoon at three,” 
she said icily, as Eugene came up with a sullen look on his 
handsome face and lent his aid while she descended from 
the victoria. 

“ But — I—” protested Mary falteringly. 

“At three,” repeated Mrs. Cohen, with a stiff bow. 
“Eugene, we will go that way and pick up a cab.” 


CHAPTER XIII 


But when Mrs. Cohen in her high-hung claret-coloured 
barouche swept up the short drive to the door of Holinhurst, 
on the very stroke of three, she was informed by the suave 
butler that Miss Levinge had gone out in a hansom directly 
after luncheon, and he could not say when she would be 
back. 

Mrs. Cohen thereupon contented herself by delivering a 
long discourse on her son’s devotion and Mary’s foolish 
flippancy to Mrs. Marx, who, having lunched more freely 
than usual on cold fish, pickled cucumbers, and almond pud- 
ding, was in a somnolent condition, and only hoped that a 
lack of argument would bring the interview to a speedy 
termination, and so give her time for a good sleep before 
tea. 

Mary, meanwhile, alone and utterly friendless in her 
great luxurious house, had flown to Lady St. Cyprien. 
This second proposal, this personal avowal of love from a 
man, troubled and frightened her. When Mrs. Montagu 
had urged reasons why Mary should permit herself to be 
engaged to Lionel, the idea of marriage had seemed so re- 
mote, so vague, that she had scarcely realised that she had 
refused. Her only memory of the interview rested on Mrs. 
Montagu’s outspoken expressions of anger and disappoint- 
ment. 

But this second offer, from a man she had but slightly 
known, and of whom she had never thought, this love suit 
pressed upon her with hot breath that fanned her cheek and 


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113 


passionate eyes that sought her own, had alarmed her. If 
Eugene Cohen had had another five minutes to plead his 
cause, his object might have been gained, for it is often the 
most timid bird that will, from fascinated fear, return to the 
lure, but fortune had not favoured him. 

Mary was alarmed, and, virginally, a little disgusted; 
but no instincts had been roused within her, and it was the 
dreaded annoyance of a repetition of the proposal through 
Mrs. Cohen that drove her for refuge to Lowndes Square, 
rather than a girlish desire to confess the first flutterings of 
an awakened heart. 

“Take off your hat, child, and sit down,” said Lady St. 
Cyprien, when Mary was announced. “ A little bird told 
me you were looking charming in the Park this morning — 
but — ” and her keen kind eyes took in every faint token of 
distress on the girl’s face — “what has happened to worry 
you, my dear?” 

“You guess I am worried then?” said Mary, forcing a 
faint smile to her mouth. 

For answer the Countess lifted a hand-mirror, quaintly 
set in old beaten silver, from a table and held it up to Mary’s 
face, reflecting her heavy-lidded eyes, humid with unshed 
tears, her pale cheeks and down-drawn mouth. 

“Look at yourself,” said Lady St. Cyprien, “then tell, 
me what has happened.” 

She put the mirror down, then laid her hands— such 
strong, firm hands— on Mary’s slender, gloved fingers. 

“ Mary, my child, be your trouble trivial or great, real or 
merely a fancy, tell it — not of necessity to me — but to some 
one, any one. You always kept your baby woes, j^our 
childish confidences, locked in your own heart. But, my 
dear, the trials, the griefs, the joys of womanhood must be 
yours now, and there will be no room for them. Or if you 
nurse them too long, and clasp them too closely, they will 
8 


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stifle you, and kill your sweet nature as ivy kills the noblest 
tree. I know your childhood has been lonely ; you have 
had neither wise advisers nor friends; you have fed your 
soul and your imagination on the musty remnants of the 
past, but now you must give your heart wholesome food, or 
it will lie like a stone within your bosom.” 

Lady St. Cyprien paused a moment, then in a lighter tone 
said: 

“Well, Mary, am I to be your confidante?^^ 

Mary slipped along the sofa that held them both till her 
shoulder touched Lady St. Cyprien. 

“If you please!” she answered simply. 

Then she related almost word for word Eugene Cohen’s 
proposal. She did not blush as she repeated what her 
would-be lover had said ; only her eyes involuntarily widened 
as though she spoke of something disagreeable to her. 

Lady St. Cyprien let her finish even so far as her confes- 
sion that she had fled before the threatened invasion of 
Mrs. Cohen. Then she spoke. 

“ But, my dear, this marriage is very different from the 
Montagu affair. Surely Mr. Cohen is a nice person, well 
off — though that need not affect you — good-looking, and a 
suitable age. It is true, there have been, I believe ” 

Here the Countess stopped. Her sense of honour urged 
her to place such a marriage in the most favourable light 
before Mary, though her desire that the girl should one day 
become Lord Stansdale’s wife tempted her with the feminine 
bait of retailing gossip about the wooer of that morning. 
But one glance at Mary’s face stayed her. It would be 
mere wanton wickedness to raise by one inch the veil of pu- 
rity which clung about the girl’s white soul. So Lady St. 
Cyprien put the curb on her tongue, and continued, with 
heroic abnegation: 

“ You must not decide so important an event without due 


WITHOUT SIN 


115 


thought. I think you should give this Mr. Cohen, who 
would appear to be really fond of you, another chance.’^ 

“I could not do that,” said Mary, in her firmest manner, 
and shaking her head. 

“ Do you not like him, then?” 

I shall never marry,” said the girl, evading the quibble, 
and with characteristic honesty speaking the truth. 

Lady St. Cyprien’s dark face assumed a mingled look of 
quiet delight and shrewd prescience. She knew that Mary 
Levinge was both proud and shy, and she felt sure that the 
girl was making a dignified assertion, in case some man 
whom she loved should never propose to her. 

“ All girls say that, my dear, and to a certain extent it is 
maidenly and right that they should. The young girl who, 
for whatever reason, openly hunts a man into matrimonial 
bondage is contemptible; but I hope, and indeed feel sure, 
that you will marry some day, my love, for a woman un- 
married is a woman marred, to misquote the old proverb. 
At present you are very young to bind yourself. You must 
see the world a little, and learn the ways of all men, before 
you choose one. And this brings me to a subject which is 
very near my heart.” 

Lady St. Cyprien dropped her voice a little. She was 
going to refer to the one grief of her life, her childlessness. 
It was a sorrow which had remained green, and which she 
had never been able to put from her. 

“ I want to ask a favour of you, for myself and for Lord 
St. Cyprien, my dear. Ah! you look surprised, and you 
are wondering what you can do for us. Mary, you can give 
us yourself for a while, until some one worthy of your love 
and yourself claims you. Stay, don’t speak; let me finish. 
We, St. Cyprien and I, have been married nearly twenty 
years; if God had been good to us we might have had a 
daughter of your age. But we never had any children. 


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Will you be our daughter? I do not ask you to leave Holm- 
hurst. It is only right that you should bear the responsi- 
bilities of your wealth, but will you be with us as much as 
possible? You are worthy of better things than can fall to 
your share if you are left to such people as the Montagus 
and Cohens. With me, you would go to the best houses in 
the kingdom, and could count among your friends the high- 
est, cleverest, most exclusive of men and women. From 
among them I hope you will one day choose a husband, and 
so find a very happy life.” 

Mary was silent for a while, but the slight twitching of 
her mouth and the restless twisting of her hands showed she 
was struggling to voice some of the thoughts and dreams 
which had been hers for so long. 

“Lady St. Cyprien, how can I thank you?” she said, 
presently, her lips trembling with emotion and her eyes 
brilliant with gathering tears. “Ah! I know, you ask no 
thanks, but it eases me to give them. If I may be with 
you sometimes, I shall be grateful ; you have been my best 
and truest' friend, and I feel you love me. But,” she lifted 
one hand slightly, then let it fall heavily on her knee again, 
“I cannot be as your daughter.” 

She shook her head, round which the loose tendrils of 
her fair hair cast a pallid halo. Two heavy tears dropped 
from her lashes and rolled swiftly down her cheeks. 

“ No thought, no persuasion, can change me. All your 
sweet tenderness, all my deep gratitude, cannot bring us 
quite together, can never bind us as mother and daughter 
should be bound. We are of a different people. I come of 
an accursed race, who yet have laboured through long 
centuries with but one hope— redemption. Your people 
have persecuted mine through the centuries. The old feud 
is dying now, I think, but not so easily or so quickly that 
you and I can be as of one flesh.” 


WITHOUT SIN 


11 


Lady St. Cyprieii sighed a little. Deep and sincere as 
was her personal affection for this charming Jewish girl, 
much as she desired her gentle companionship, highly as 
she valued her sweet affection, her own heart, versed in 
knowledge of the world and the ways of men, admitted with 
most characteristic honesty the absolute justice of Mary’s 
words. To hear the truth grieved her all the more in that 
she fully grasped the sincerity of the girl’s meaning. 

She might advise and befriend Mary, who in turn might 
confide in and consult her; the perfection of unbounded 
friendship and trust might exist between them, but, sooner 
or later, the difference that lies immutably between the 
people of the East and West must arise. It might be 
trivial or unsurmountable ; a question of sociology or a mat- 
ter of religious ethics, or it might range from the cut of a 
gown to the choice of a husband. 

But what ever it might be about, the difference would 
come, and love and friendship would break down before a 
habit of body or trick of thought engendered in either, 
through scores of ancestors. Lady St. Cyprien felt instinc- 
tively that not yet were the Jew and the Gentile to be as 
one, and again she sighed. 

Her evident disappointment wrung Mary’s heart. She 
turned her swimming eyes on her friend and held out one 
slender hand. 

“Yes, I will be with you,” she said softly, “when and 
where you wish — but my life will not be lived in ballrooms, 
my destiny will not be fulfilled— in society. May I go home 
now?” 

Meekly, and like a little child, she held her sweet mouth 
to Lady St. Cyprien to kiss, then she left the house. 

“ That girl is terribly nervous, ” said Lady St. Cyprien 
aloud, in an effort to steady her stirred emotions, as she 
heard the front door close behind Mary. “Noel Marrable 


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wa« quite rigiit when he said some time ago that she lacked 
mental self-control. I cannot but wish that she were less 
fanciful, less imaginative. These strange ideas she has are 
hardly health}^ But — she is very young — and impressions 
fade so quickly from girl’s minds. I must take her to 
Mason’s next week, and interest her about her gowns for 
the season, and Stansdale must be a little attentive. This 
young Jew has evidently rushed at his fences and fallen at 
the first. Stansdale will manage his wooing better than 
that, and try and bring her to a more natural state of mind.” 

When Mary reached home the lovely March day was draw- 
ing to a close. It was a Friday, and within an hour, when 
the sun would have set, the Sabbath would begin. 

As usual, Martin Baird was expected to dinner, and Mary 
went straight to her room to change her white cloth frock 
for a soft, flowing gown of snowy China silk. She was just 
dressed when a fluttering knock at the door heralded Mrs. 
Marx. She so seldom left her own apartments, that Mary 
instinctively felt that this incursion boded no good. 

It was, however, short-lived, for Mrs. Marx was neither 
an adept at arranging her ideas, nor at giving them utter- 
ance. Her brief visit resolved itself into a whining com- 
plaint, spoken in a barbarous mixture of Polish, English, 
and Yiddish, concerning Maiy’s wickedness in refusing to 
become the wife of Eugene Cohen, cf J^frs. Cohen’s disap- 
pointment, of Ephraim Levinge’s anger — for she seemed to 
be oblivious of his death -and of the wrath which the 
Judaical authorities would pour on Mary’s head when they 
learnt that she chose her friends from among an alien race. 
Her muddled remonstrances given forth, Mrs. Marx retired, 
quite satisfied, to her own rooms. 

The protest had been ridiculous, but it wearied Mary 
who was already unstrung by the emotions of the day. She 
looked tired and worn as she faced Baird at dinner that night; 


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and he, with the ever-present consciousness of her heart 
loneliness, was deeply moved by the mournful expression 
of her pale face. 

He spoke of her weary mien, and then she made an effort 
to be brighter. 

“I am only tired,’’ she said, with a faint smile. “Tired 
of doing nothing, I expect. After dinner we will have a 
long turn at the books. I shall be a very stern mistress 
this evening, and shall complain of everything.” 

But the books were never looked at after all, for at the 
end of dinner she overset a glass, which broke as it fell, 
and cut her across the wrist. 

The pain was trifling, but the bleeding was severe for a 
few minutes, and gave her a headache. She spent the even- 
ing lying, white and weary, on the sofa, which stood beneath 
the old panel picture of the Madonna. 

Baird remarked how the likeness between the painted 
face and the living girl had deepened, but added, with his 
rare smile : 

“ If you grow so pale. Miss Levinge, there will be but 
little resemblance left.” 

She shook her head. 

“ You must not say that, Martin. I have been like her 
ever since I was a child. I am like her still — I shall be 
like her in the future.” 

Then she fell into thought, with her eyes closed against 
the world, and the corners of her full, curved mouth 
pressed together. 


CHAPTER XIV 


Next morning Mary rose with a fuller, happier sense of 
life than she had felt yesterday. The young cannot always 
fix their eyes upon the future, and the present was fair for 
her and not without interest. As she dressed, the memory 
came to her that she was to lunch that day with Lady Theo 
Bellastier, and she chose her prettiest white gown to honour 
the occasion. 

Lady Theo Bellastier’s drawing-room in Wilton Place 
was a reflex of herself. Furniture of extraordinary ugli- 
ness — bought in the long ago by the worthy old country 
gentleman whom Lady Theo called husband” when she 
noticed him at all — formed a lumbering background to the 
thousand prettinesses and impertinences which formed her 
ladyship’s idea of decoration. 

A huge console table of gloomy mahogany and bilious 
Sienna marble was covered with half-a-dozen outrageous 
little statuettes in clear Parian china and many bowls of 
sweet-scented flowers. 

Bertie Chant had said one day that the clumsy table with 
its airy burden of pert figures and exquisite flowers reminded 
him of Lady Theo’s face, with her wide mouth, vulgar nose, 
and divine eyes, and the simile was not ill-thought out — for 
Bertie Chant. 

Lady Theo was telling her assembled guests this personal 
joke, of which she was rather proud, as Mary Levinge was 
announced. 

Lady St. Cyprien was seated in the window, discussing 


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a new altar-piece for her country parish church with Eliot 
Mayne, the artist, who was more than usually picturesque 
in chevehcre and Philistine in garments. She paused in her 
talk as Mary was announced, and noted with some degree 
of pleasure with what self-possession the girl entered the 
room. Mary greeted those she knew with quiet ease, and 
acknowledged two or three introductions with a charming 
smile. 

“ It is marvellous to think that such manners ever came 
out of a Ghetto,” murmured Lady St. Cyprien. 

“ I beg your pardon, ” said Eliot Mayne. “ I do not un- 
derstand.” 

“I was guilty of thinking aloud, Mr. Mayne,” laughed 
Lady St. Cyprien, and at the same time nodding across the 
room to Mary. 

“ Who is that girl in white who has just come in?” asked 
the artist. “ She is pretty, of course ; but somehow that 
seems scarcely the word to describe her. Every woman is 
pretty in her own particular line nowadays ; but that face 
is neither of our century nor of our standard of beauty.” 

He drew his brows together above his keen dark eyes, as 
though a dead memory were struggling to live again. 

“ It is a strange thing. Lady St. Cyprien, but in an odd 
way that face gives one the impression of scarcely being of 
this world at all.” 

Lady St. Cyprien started, and a shade of annoyance 
clouded her face. Eliot Mayne’s words recalled too vividly 
the conversation of yesterday, words she wished and pur- 
posed putting away from her memory for ever. 

“Please do not say anything so uncanny,” she cried, in 
her most downright manner; “particularly before Miss Le- 
vinge herself. She is a most sweet girl, but rather full of 
fancies. ” 

“Is that Miss Levinge?” cried Mayne, a vivid interest 


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growing in his voice. “ Is that the child with the yellow 
hair and the long taper hands I used to see j^ears ago at old 
Levinge’s place in Bond Street? How singularly beautiful 
she has grown.” 

With the gaucherie an indulgent society fosters in the 
“ artistic” temperament, he rose slowly from Lady St. Gyp- 
rieii’s side, and, crossing the room, made himself known 
to Mary. 

The luncheon was a great success. Lady Theo, who 
believed in the sociability of a round table and an indis- 
criminate “ salad” of people, laughed and chattered between 
a music-hall singer famous for delineations of inebriety and 
a pushing politician who had hopes of a seat in the Cabinet 
before the week was out. 

Mary was next Lord Stansdaie. The nervous tears of 
the previous day had acted as a storm which had cleared 
the air, and she was brighter and more animated than 
usual. 

“Now tell me who everybody is,” she said, when the 
first two courses had been duly discussed. 

“That’s not so easy,” laughed Stansdaie. “Lady Theo 
ought always to issue biographical sketches of her guests. 
One is always sure that everybody here is somebody — after 
a fashion, though it is not always easy to fix them.” 

“Well, tell me about those whom you can fix,” persisted 
Mary. “Now, what is the man doing here who is sitting 
between Lady St. Cyprien and Dr. Marrable? He looks 
like a labourer and workman of some sort. ” 

“Wrong the first time, Miss Levinge. That man 
couldn’t work to save his life, and wouldn’t if he could.” 

“Then who is he? He’s got on a flannel shirt.” 

“He is an Anarchist of the leather-lunged order. He 
has a fine though somewhat broad flow of language, which 
he pours forth at East End Radical Clubs three days a week 


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123 


and on Sundays in Hyde Park. He quails like a cur every 
time one of Lady Theo’s big footmen goes near him, and he 
has up to now gone through every course with determina- 
tion and one knife and fork. He will drink all he can get, 
and to-morrow will denounce the aristocracy and their de- 
grading luxury in more full-flavoured language than ever.” 

‘‘And who is the queer-looking woman on Dr. Marrable’s 
left?” 

“Mrs. Susan Gordon. She’s a New Woman, you know. 
Didn’t you catch sight of her — extremities upstairs? She 
is attired in canvas shoes, ribbed woollen stockings, and 
breeches. She arrived here on a bicycle. She holds an- 
tique and worn-out theories concerning the superiority of 
women. ” 

“ Is she married?” 

“ Yes, to a rather nice little fellow. He hunts with the 
Quorn all the winter, then goes and fishes in Norway till 
the cubbing begins. His name is Dick Massingham.” 

“ Massingham ! But you called her Gordon — Mrs. Susan 
Gordon — just now.” 

“Oh! that’s one of her theories. She thinks that the 
adoption of a husband’s name on marriage is an outward 
and visible sign of a moral and physical degradation. Nice 
woman, isn’t she?” 

“I am afraid I think her horrid; but then, you see, the 
women of my people have not yet outgrown the Orientalism 
of centuries,” said Mary frankly. 

Lord Stansdale was silent. He was honestly and truly 
in love with Mary. His was not perhaps a very grand 
passion, but then the high-born English temperament does 
not readily lend itself to ecstatics about anything. He 
only knew that he found her the prettiest girl in London, 
that her “ form” was perfectly unimpeachable, and that if 
he should win her for his wife, he would make her a very 


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affectionate and faithful husband. Of her money he 
thought but little, of her family not at all. One thing only 
distressed him at times. Stansdale felt for Jews all the 
contempt with which a triumphant nation regards the con- 
quered. With the glorious traditions of an ancestry of 
warriors before him, he could feel nothing but supreme 
disdain for a race which had only kept a place among 
nations by liiickstering and intriguing. It galled his pride 
and wounrled his vanity to know that the woman he loved 
and respected was sprung from a people he despised, and 
he was annoyed that she should seek to remind him of the 
fact. 

“ That is Eliot Mayne, is it not?” went on Mary, inno- 
cent of having vexed her neighbour. “ I often saw him at 
the Galleries in my grandfather^s lifetime. But who is 
the odd man next to him? The one with the riiig|on his 
thumb and the stiff round collar.” 

“ Don’t you know Erastus Bawdon, Miss Levinge? 
Why, he is the greatest dilettante in religion and amateur 
ecclesiastical art of our day. He has professed all faiths 
in his time, even your own, but he is just now a Koman 
Catholic. He is enormously rich, and is building an 
exquisite church in the grounds of his house in Berkshire. 
He has been scouring Europe for carvings, pictures, and 
statues. He considers that the true crux of religion lies in 
art, and he attributes the diminished power of the Pope in 
England to the fact that the pictures in Roman Catholic 
places of worship are vilely drawn and horribly coloured, 
and that the statues are faulty in modelling and la(;king 
in intention.” 

Mary looked across at Mr. Bawdon. He was a big, heavy 
man, with a coarse mouth and a square jaw, closely shaven. 
His short black hair, which was very thick on the temples, 
was brushed forward on to his forehead in a manner sug- 


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125 


gesting a tonsure on the crown. His attire was severe, and 
of a priestly cut, his only ornament being a magnificent 
thumb-ring set with a carved emerald. In a voice both 
sonorous and deep he was laying down the law to Eliot 
Mayne, who, replete with the products of Lady Theo's chef, 
was nodding his artistically arranged head in comfortable 
acquiescence. 

“ I maintain that even the greatest masters erred in this 
matter. They saw their Marys and other holy women with 
the eyes of a lover, or at best a husband. The same model 
would sit for the Holy Mother and the Magdalen. Look 
at the fat German fraus, the lovely, loose-living Venetians, 
the blowsy Flamandes, who posed through centuries for 
saints, and gave religion its ideal Virgin Marys. It was 
nothing short of blasphemy, and bad art into the bargain.’’ 

His voice rose, and his emphatic words and ponderous 
gestures stilled the tattle of the table. 

Latter-day church art is even worse, for it is founded 
on the most debased traditions. Noel Patou’s pictures 
could not inspire a single spark of religious sentiment. I 
would sooner far hang Watts’s ‘‘ Love and Life” above an 
altar than The Good Shepherd.” As for my own church, 
I am deterimned it shall go bare of pictures and sculptured 
art till I can find something which will aid religion. My 
Lady Chapel shall have no image of the Virgin until I see 
a face which suggests by its beauty and innocence the 
Mother of ” 

Mr. Bawdon lifted his glass in his big hairy hand, 
intending to drink when he had finished speaking. His 
eyes met those of Mary. She sat just opposite to him, and 
as silence fell upon the rest of the party, her whole atten- 
tion had been given to him. With a faint flush staining 
the fair pallor of her cheeks, her wax-white lids half 
lowered over her eyes, the slender thread of her brows 


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crossing the round full forehead, and her mouth slightly 
relaxed from its usual compression, she looked across the 
table at the big ugly man, with the didactic manner and 
the square, blue chin. 

For one long silent minute Mr. Bawdon stared at Mary 
in the same way as he would have scrutinised a picture. 
Then Lady Theo proposed cigarettes and coffee upstairs; 
the women fluttered from the room, with the men in a com- 
pact mass at their heels. 

Once upstairs the stemmed tide of chatter broke out 
again. The Anarchist, with a fine cigar between his lips, 
and black coffee and liqueur at his side, was blinking in 
muddled astonishment at a wonderfully gowned American, 
who had introduced herself to him, and began the conver- 
sation by telling him he was “just too sweet for anything.*’ 

Mrs. Susan Gordon tackled Dr. Marrable on a “nice” 
point concerning sex relationship. Lady Theo wandered to 
the piano with a long-locked Italian musician who had come 
to London to make his fortune. Mary slipped into a low 
seat at Lady St. Cyprien’s side, while Lord Stansdale and 
Bertie Chant joined Eliot Mayne and Mr. Bawdon, at the 
further end of the room, where a card-table was set out. 

“My dear,” began Lady St. Cyprien. “If you always 
look as pretty as you do this afternoon, I shall have the 
responsibility of a beauty as well as an heiress on my 
shoulders all the season.” 

“ Ah ! but I never promised. ” 

“ I know you didn’t, but all the same you cannot go 
about even a little by yourself. I will let you off balls and 
races, till you beg me to take you to them, but you are too 
fond of music not to wish to go to the Opera sometimes. 
And you must drive every day, and go to a few really good 
houses with me. Why, you already are all the better for 
coming out to-day.” 


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127 


“Which I was nearly not able to do— I hurt my hand last 
night at dinner. I intended to show it to Dr. Marrable this 
morning, but was afraid he would forbid me to come here.’’ 

She smiled across to where he was suffering torments at 
the tongue of Mrs. Susan Gordon. 

“Oh! my dear, Noel Marrable’s patients are all women, 
and he has learnt the art of humouring them. That is the 
true secret of his success.” 

Bertie Chant, red-faced and smiling above the newest 
and most startling thing in cravats, ambled towards them. 

“Miss Mary Levinge, the new beauty, looked quite 
charming in white,” he quoted from a prospective para- 
graph, which he intended to write on his return home. 
“ Lady St. Cyprien, both Mr. Eliot Mayne and Mr. Bawdon 
have a great favour to ask of your fair charge, and want to 
get you on their side. I told them that you were a shock- 
ing dragon, and that a lot of intercession was necessary.” 

He put his sleek head on one side and looked waggish. 
Ten minutes later it travelled round the room that at the 
request of Mr. Erastus Bawdon, Miss Levinge had con- 
sented to give sittings to Mr. Mayne for a picture of the 
Blessed Virgin, which would ultimately be placed above 
the altar in his new church. 

Every one was enraptured : Lady Theo, that such an 
artistic event should have occurred in her Philistine abode; 
Bertie Chant, because he foresaw whole columns of smart, 
suggestive copy; Lord Stansdale, because it was a fitting 
tribute to the beauty and purity of the girl he admired. 
The little American, frantic to be “in the know,” left her 
anarchist and frankly stared at Mary with a view to copy- 
ing her style; Mrs. Susan Gordon regarded the affair as a 
vindication of the sex. Only Lady St. Cyprien felt a 
vague dislike to the scheme, which she could neither for- 
mulate nor voice. 


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Mary stood among them all, pale and moved. An 
ineffable joy that she was deemed worthy to pose as a 
model for her ideal, thrilled her, and made her blind and 
deaf to her surroundings. A rapt look crept over her 
face — she was fast drifting into a dream of perfect beati- 
tude when Dr. Marrable touched her arm. 

You are looking tired. Miss Levinge, you had better let 
me see you to your carriage.” 

He took her from the room, and placing her in her 
brougham, ordered her to drive home and to lie down. 


CHAPTER XV 


Can’t I take a rest? I feel like dropping.” 

Eliot Mayne shot a keen glance from the canvas on which 
he was working at the tired model, and then back again to 
the picture. 

“I shan’t keep you long now, Rosie,” he said, “but I 
want to get the pose perfectly right this morning, and if 
you can stand still for a few minutes longer without faint- 
ing, you can rest as long as you like — and I promise not to 
mind if you charge me double this time!” 

“ Will you promise me something else?” asked the girl a 
minute later. “ Will you promise not to get somebody else 
to sit for the hands?” 

“Why?” he remarked indifferently. 

The girl almost moved in her eagerness. 

“ Because if I can say I’ve sat to you for hands as well 
as bust and figure, lots of others will be certain to take 
me.” 

“Very well, I’ll see what I can do.” 

“But I want you to promise,” insisted the model. 

“All right then, I promise. Now, another five minutes.” 

With a slight sigh the model resigned herself to the 
inevitable, while the artist, with bent brows and swiftly 
moving brush, worked intently at the exquisite nude figure 
which he intended to make the chief interest in his latest 
version of St. Anthony’s Temptation, which was as nearly 
a sacred subject as Mayne’ s fleshly instincts could combine 


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with religious art without offending his own particular 
patrons. He worked rapidly, and already the canvas 
throbbed with actualities. 

The niodel’s throne was drawn into the very heart of the 
flood of sharp white light that flowed like an unrelenting 
sea through the great north window. Behind it was slung 
from the ceiling a curtain of canvas, quaintly coloured iu 
faded distemper work. It looked like dull shot velvet in 
the morning radiance, and its dim shadows threw up in 
crude contrast the intense fairness of the model who, with 
airy pose and alluring gesture, represented the very crown 
of man’s temptation — young and exquisitely beautiful 
womanhood. Scarcely draped by the cloud-like gauze scarf 
that lost its substance against the nacreous gleam of her 
flawless skin, the girl stood all unabashed by the exposed 
perfection of line and limb in the pitiless glare of the cold 
reflected light. Airily poised on one slender foot, she held 
out a beckoning hand. 

“There!” said Mayne, suddenly rising; “That pose is 
perfect, but it’s a strain I know. Now you may rest.” 

The naked girl stepped from the throne and stretched 
her stiffened muscles before dropping into a deep carved 
chair, over which a black bearskin was flung. 

“Yes! it is a bit of a twister, that attitude, but you 
know I always like to go one better than the others, and 
this beats the Solomon girl.” 

“You mean ‘Salome,’ Rosie.” 

“Perhaps I do, but anyway they’ll all know who sat for 
the temptress party, at the first glance. Rosie Graves all 
over! they’ll say, and won’t I have a crow over the other 
models at the Academy private view?” 

“Well, they won’t be far out, will they?” said Mayne, 
with a light laugh at the girl’s social ambition, glancing 
from the figure on the canvas to the form of the girl in the 


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131 


chair. With a tardy sense that she was not at work, Rosie 
drew the folds of the fur about her. 

Mayne with light touches worked on the dark background 
as she sat and chattered. 

“ For goodness’ sake give me a cigarette, or smoke your- 
self,” said Rosie Graves suddenly. “This place of yours 
is beastly close this morning.” 

Mayne laid down his brushes, and drawing out a small 
silver cigarette case from his pocket, tossed it to the model. 

“ What rubbishy little things!” she cried with contempt, 
helping herself. 

“ Yes, they are small, and you’re only going to get one 
of them to-day.” 

“ Why so stingy ?” 

“I’m not stingy, my dear; you can take them all, but 
you Inustn’t smoke more than one here. A lady is coming 
to sit presently, and I don’t suppose she’d care to find the 
studio reeking of smoke, ” replied Mayne. 

A malicious gleam crept into the depths of Rosie Graves’ 
velvety brown eyes, and the corners of her full scarlet 
mouth curled with glee. 

“Ha! ha! that’s why the place is all fixed up with flow- 
ers; I thought you hadn’t been out buying lilies for me.” 

“I buy flowers for no one, Rosie, and you know it,” said 
Mayne, assuming the austerity of the pictured saint before 
him. 

“ Oh ! what about big Lisa?” cried Rosie, teasingly, as 
she blew a ring into the air, and slipped one pink-tipped 
finger through the filmy circlet. “ She always brought no 
end of a bunch from here that time she and I and Emmie 
Smith were sitting to old Arundel for his ‘Judgment of 
Paris.’ She always came from you to him, and I used to 
see ’em. When she was in a good temper, we each got a 
flower.” 


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Eliot Mayne laughed the curious little laugh that always 
implies admission to an impeachment of gallantry. 

“Heavens! what an ideal Magdalen that woman was.” 

“Yes, for she always gave your flowers to young 
Marshall.” 

“ Did she?” 

“ Rather.” 

“What’s become of her?” 

Rosie simpered with affected reticence before she spoke. 
“After she followed Bertie Vernon to New York and he 
threw her over, she joined some burlesque show out there. 
Teddy Cobbe— you know that scrubby little chap who’s 
just joined the Newlyn lot— saw her with an awful snide 
crowd when he was in the States last summer. He said 
she’d dyed her hair yellow and gone fat, and she had come 
down to sitting to photographers and for ‘living pictures.’ 
Love and drink spoils ’em all,” said Rosie, taking advan- 
tage of Mayne’ s abstraction to let her tongue run on, 
“ Why, look at me, I’ve had my temptations as well as 
most of ’em, and I like a glass of fizz as much as anybody 
and had more chances of getting it, but I don’t touch it, 
not me! I know better.” 

With the pride of a dealer who offers his best wares to a 
privileged customer, she shook the white beauties of her 
perfect body free from the soft fur covering and, drawing 
herself up to her full height, glanced lovingly at the 
delicious curves which swept in harmonious lines from her 
firm, rounded bosom to the slender ankles and blue- veined 
marble of her delicately arched feet. 

“What’s the result? They’re falling over each other to 
get me to go to Paris, but as long as the pay keeps good 
and I haven’t to go touting round Campden Hill and St. 
John’s Wood for work, London’s good enough for me. 
I’m saving a bit of money, and when I’m sick of the life, I 


WITHOUT SIN 133 

can marry an old Academician and sit to him. No models 
inside my house. Not me!” 

But to his model's diatribes on the failings and ambitions 
of her profession, Mayne was deaf. Sunk in the luxurious 
depths of his great chair hung with old Spanish leather, he 
slipped into a waking dream, in which the rare bit of 
womanliood at his side had no entity. Through the faint 
blue wreaths of the curling smoke he sent his eyes travel- 
ling from the misty distance of the open oak roof, crossed 
and recrossed with straight square-cut beams, to the high 
level where the wood-work ended, and the plaster walls, 
painted a cold stone grey, began. In the first ardour of 
ascetic yestheticism, when he had nailed his metier to the 
painting of pale martyrs and repentant Magdalens, Mayne 
had thought that monastic surroundings and uncompromis- 
ing outlines would blossom into radiant colour and never- 
fading beauty, as in the golden age of art. 

In that early enthusiasm he had built his studio in the 
guise of those chill chapels where the pursuit of the divine 
is carried on under a form of penance for the human. But 
he found too soon that no monkish fire of faith touched his 
pencil, that he could not snatch inspiration from mere 
dreams of fair faces, of pure virgins, and of slaughtered 
saints. So by degrees the hard grey walls were lined with 
Eastern silks, strips of rare leathers, with fine panels of old 
carvings, and faces from the long-since dead hands of the 
great masters. In every degree of resignation, in every 
phase of torture, the saints and martyrs, the Christs and 
Virgins, and fair, frail Magdalens looked back at him with 
their meek eyes. Perhaps it was the recollection of the 
lost Lisa that made him appreciate, with a shadowy smile 
of self-scorn creeping round his bearded lips, that from the 
creations of his own brain and hands there emanated a 
subtle, indefinable suggestion of mockery, for his apostles 


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were merely satyrs, his Magdaleiis iinrepeiitaiit. He had 
noticed it before, and the knowledge of the flesh that 
thrilled him at such times again angered him and spurred 
h!m from his purposeless thoughts. 

“A quarter to eleven!” he cried suddenly, “Rosie, I’ll 
give you ten minutes to get out of this. Hurry, there’s a 
good girl.” 

With a shrug of her shapely shoulders Rosie Graves 
passed leisurely down the length of the great studio, to 
where a heavy screen of carved black oak marked the 
entrance to a tiny dressing-room. Among the devout old 
pictures and rich church hangings, which bore ecclesiastical 
emblems in every rich fold, through the picturesque con- 
fusion of inlaid chairs and old church coffers, she carried 
the glory of the world and the epitome of heaven, a wo- 
man’s perfect beauty. 

Even the brightness of the morning faded a little as she 
picked up her clothes, and the gleaming whiteness of her 
body was lost behind the dusky shadows of the black oak 
screen; yet Eliot Mayne breathed freer as she went, and in 
the breathing savoured the odour of tobacco, and of the 
strong perfume that the girl affected. 

With fastidious haste he lit at the small glowing fire a 
score of scented joss-sticks, which he thrust in the pierced 
silver cover of an old thurible, swinging on finely chased 
silver chains from «a bracket that Cellini might have chis- 
elled. As the diaphanous blue smoke curled gently up- 
wards, and mingled its pungent fragrance with the sweeter 
scent of the flowers, he murmured : 

“That will get rid of the smell of tobacco.” 

He moved about, slowly re-arranging the white lilies 
which stood erect in vases of Japanese bronze in every 
corner of the studio. From among the dim shadows cast all 
about the wide fireplace by a baldachino of early Italian inlay 


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135 


work, the flowers gleamed out like great shining stars, while 
beneath the big north window they had been arranged with 
mediaeval stiffness, in a long row of single blossoms, that 
looked creaniily transparent against the brilliant light. 

“How strong they are. They’ve given me a headache 
already,” he cried, and stretched his hand out to touch the 
cool white flowers, whose yellow tongues gave them the 
appearance of sw^ans that had thrust up their heads from 
the reeds to be caressed. 

A touch on his arm made him turn. Rosie, dressed for 
the street in a smart little frock of pale blue, stood at his 
elbow and smiled deliciously at him from under the wide 
brim of her hat. 

“Give me a kiss for being such a good girl,” she said 
prettily, and sliding up to him. “ When are you going to 
take me out again?” she wheedled. 

He laughed a little as he picked out her morning’s wage 
from a handful of coin. 

“ You’re an awful baby still, Rosie, though you are the 
best-made woman in London. There’s your money and 
there’s your kiss,” and he lightly brushed her cheek with 
his lips. “ Now, where do you want to go to-night?” 

“Anywhere that’s bright and jolly — one of the music- 
halls — and supper afterwards?” persisted the model. 

“If you like.” 

“ But no champagne, you know, ” she laughed. 

“As you please, my girl.” 

Rosie Graves began to draw a pair of lemon -coloured 
gloves over her shapely hands. 

“ Who’s the lady all the flowers are for?” she said sud- 
denly, looking at Mayne through her lowered lashes. 

“ Merely a young lady who ” 

“Is not going to sit for the temptress?” and Rosie nod- 
ded towards the St. Anthony. 


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“Good heavens, no!” cried Mayne vehemently. 

“Not even the hands?” teased the girl. 

“Of course not. Didn’t I promise you ?” 

“And she don’t like tobacco?” 

“ Many young ladies don’t.” 

Kosie tittered ostentatiously, and tossed her feathered 
hat. 

“Then if she’s so mighty particular about smells I ad- 
vise you to open a window, for those burning things and all 
these flowers are enough to turn anybody faint.” 

“What nonsense. You’re as fussy as a fine lady your- 
self. Now off you go!” 

Kaising herself on tiptoe to reach his superior height, 
she kissed him on the mouth, then ran laughing down the 
studio. 

“Miss Levinge,” announced the servant, and, as Rosie 
Graves whisked her pale-blue skirts through a side door, 
Eliot Mayne advanced to meet his sitter. 

Mary, in a cool white linen gown and simple, broad- 
leaved hat, entered alone, bringing into the bizarre affecta- 
tions and false art of the studio, now heavy with the ming- 
ling odours of lilies and the aromatic vapour of the burning 
incense, a delicious atmosphere of pure morning freshness. 

“ You are still determined to pose for the whole picture. 
Miss Levinge?” said Mayne, turning the just begun portrait 
of Mary, as the Holy Virgin, towards the light. 

“ Yes, if you please, Mr. Mayne. I should like the whole 
picture to be really me. I think Mr. Bawdon would wish 
it too, and I shall not at all mind sitting.” 

“ I will make it as easy for you as possible. We will 
begin as soon as you have changed your dress for the one 
which you will find in this room.” 

A little later Mary came out of the dressing-room trans- 
formed from the young lady of to-day into a mediaeval 


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maiden. Her unbound hair hung like a curtain of spun 
silk about her bare shoulders and open throat, where it 
made corn-coloured shadows. She wore a straight gown of 
soft white woollen, that fell in simple pleats from the low- 
cut round neckband to her sandalled feet. A high-backed 
chair was her seat upon the artist’s throne. Across her 
knees, so delicately outlined by the draperies, Mayne laid 
a great sheaf of the heavy scented lilies, and round her feet 
they were clustered with such art that she herself seemed 
one of them, growing upwards in a very cloud of perfume. 
In her right hand she held sceptre-wise a tall green rod, 
crowned only with one blossom. It gleamed against the 
pale gold threads of her hair like frosted silver, and the 
petals brushed the pure outline of her cheek. 

“It is lucky that Bawdon cannot see you now. Miss 
Levinge,” said Mayne, as with his freshly set palette he 
took his place before the easel and began to paint. 

“ Why?” said Mary innocently. 

“ Oh ! because he then would never be satisfied with my 
picture. ” 

But Mary did not answer him. Already the fervour of 
reverence had fallen on her, and the world had drifted by, 
leaving her alone with the rapture of purity, and innocence 
of all save the joy of at last figuring in resemblance to the 
beloved picture of her early days, round which Martin 
Baird had wound so many beautiful legends. With her 
grey eyes fixed all unseeing before her, with her ears deaf 
to aught save singing angels and the formless suggestions 
of her own imagination, she sat, statue-like in stillness, and 
statue-like in white purity. 

Her silence annoyed Mayne singularly. That a pretty 
woman should flout one of his compliments he was neither 
fool nor coxcomb enough to mind — as a general rule. But 
to-day he was nervous and vaguely irritable. The heavy 


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perfume of the flowers, the sickly odour of the incense, and 
the sweet spring air which made the birds build, and the 
leaves and blossoms break, warmed the blood in his veins, 
till his hand grew restless and his brain fantastic. The 
charm of the temptress he had been painting was over him, 
and between the Virgin on which he worked, and the sitter 
there floated the large, luscious red lips of the Lisa of long 
ago, and the smooth, warm, pink skin and ideal outlines 
of Kose. A hundred times he only cleared his throbbing 
brain by resting his burning eyes on the incarnation of 
young girlhood before him, but a hundred times Lisa and 
Rose mocked at him from the picture. 

Once as he looked up he caught sight of the St. Anthony^ s 
Temptation, on which he had been working an hour back. 
It was so turned that only he could see it, and the flesh 
tints of the temptress gleamed from the misty background 
like a living woman. 

Again he looked at his sitter. She was still enwrapt in 
her own thoughts and so immovable that the drapery over 
her bosom did not stir. How sweet in expression she was, 
how plaintive, and how like a child’s was the sad droop of 
her mouth; and yet how exquisitely womanly, how desir- 
able was that full line of her throat and the nascent curve 
of her bosom. How false, he thought, was his art compared 
to nature, as he realised that it is purity that is the tempter. 

Sharply he turned his gaze away, to see Rose smiling at 
him from that other canvas, while her outstretched dimpled 
hands seemed to point at Mary and force his eyes back to 
her. 

How fine and delicate were the fingers that held the lily 
wand, her sceptre of virginity, and how he envied the jeal- 
ous sleeve that fell too low upon her arm. His eyes grew 
dark as he gazed and gazed again at her, as though he would 
have forced his thoughts upon her, and never at the picture 


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139 


before him. Yet lie was conscious of painting all the time, 
until that consciousness grew to artistic instinct, and for 
one moment dominated the man. He glanced at the canvas, 
then flushed with shame at the mocking outrage he had done 
the young girl by even allowing his brush to run riot in 
bosom fills of warm light and cool shadows that only his 
mind’s eye saw. With a hasty gesture he smudged his An- 
gers across the still fresh paint, and in the act of doing so 
looked once more at Mary. 

Was she asleep? Her head lay against the tall back of 
the chair, the pallor of her cheek was shadowed only by her 
lowered lashes. The hand that but a moment since had held 
the sceptre of maidenhood hung nerveless at her side, and 
the lilies had fallen from her knees all bruised to the floor. 

Half-curious, half- frightened, he advanced and touched 
her shoulder gently, as though to waken her, but she did not 
move. He raised her soft fingers, but no pulse answered 
to his own. He laid one hand above her heart, almost fear- 
ful that it had ceased to beat ; but it throbbed feebly under 
his lingering touch, and he knew then that she had swooned. 
The cloying sweetness of her much-loved flowers had 
strangled her and blanched her lips and cheeks to their own 
stainless pallor. He raised her in his arms and carried her 
to the couch in the alcove. As he laid her down her gold 
hair made an aureole of faint light about the whiteness of 
her face. A spray of lilies he had caught up with her fell 
crushed and dying to the ground. 

She did not move, and scarcely seemed to breathe. He 
went hastily to the door, intent on summoning aid. He 
hesitated. “Would there be gossip and talk if he called?” 
he asked himself. His fingers, made nerveless by indeci- 
sion, fell upon the key instead of the handle he had sought. 
Once again he paused, then slowly turned the key, and 
went back on tiptoe to where she lay, white among the 


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cushions as a drift of pure snow in the purple hollows of 
the hills. 

He gazed on her till the impulse grew too strong, and, 
bending down, he caught the fair face between his two hot 
palms and kissed the girl long and passionately on the lips. 


CHAPTER XVI 


The next day was Sunday. 

The March morning had broken grey and cold. An easter- 
ly wind had sprung up in the night, and now drove a dirty 
scud from the North Sea across the drab hued heavens. 
The mating birds piped dolefully to each other in the sparse- 
ly foliaged trees, and the early flowering lilacs in the 
sheltered garden of Holmhurst showered down a mauve rain 
of shattered blossoms as each stormy gust passed by. 

Mary was in her sitting-room, a dainty nest with windows 
looking to the south and west. The furniture and hangings 
were pale in colour and showed a vague opalescence of silver 
greys and shaded greens and pinks against the white walls. 
Giant palms and flowers in gorgeous masses lent to the room 
a sensation of space and atmosphere, which was enhanced 
by the cloud-flecked painted blue ceiling, across which a 
flight of swallows trailed, and a branch of rosy fruit blossom 
swayed airily. On the white walls hung a few pictures : a 
perfect Corot, a Turner which palpitated with the crimson 
and golden glow of a setting sun, a scrap of Norfolk as seen 
by Gainsborough’s eyes, all pearl-grey and willow-green, 
and such other landscapes as had caught the girl’s fancy or 
appealed to her taste. 

Set in a shallow niche between two silver vases filled 
with white roses and shadowed by the interlacing branches 
of two tall palms was the little picture of the Madonna, 
which had been taken from the art gallery when Mary moved 
into her new home. A iJt’ia-Dleu^ carved by an Italian 


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master hand, and a narrow shelf edged with a lace that once 
had trimmed a Cardinal’s robe, were before the picture. A 
single Eucharist lily, spotless and waxen, and a golden cru- 
cifix lay on the shelf. From beneath the verdant arch of 
towering palms the fair face, meekly beautiful, and framed 
by the veil of cunningly painted gauze, gleamed like a living 
thing, while the watery sun-rays, fighting through the 
hurrying cloud-rack, struck faint glints of light from the 
roughly chased clasp on the girlish breast. 

Kneeling on the low praying-chair, with her head pressed 
close against the glass, as in her most childish days, was 
Mary. The tender light, filtering through the broad leaves, 
cast the same reftection across the picture and girl, and em- 
braced both in an atmosphere of mysticism. Mary was very 
pale, colourless as wax, save for the soft velvety shadow 
cast by her long lashes, and the faint tracery of her delicate 
eyebrows. In the shifting light of the chill March day the 
waved masses of her hair, coiled low in the hollow of her 
neck, lost their sanguine, auburn tints, and looked white as 
bleached flax against the green pallor of her skin. 

Her eyes, darkened almost to a sapphire-blue beneath 
their full lids, were as the eyes of one who had gazed beyond 
the limits of a fleshly world and had seen the invisible. As 
with rapt, upturned look she strove to pierce the calm depths 
of the mild pictured face, to force the truth and the secret 
from the sweet, mute mouth, her own pale features were 
transfigured with a great hope and a mighty fear, a pre- 
monition of fulfilment, and the anticipation of a realised 
desire. 

The room was very still, for the fire had burned itself into 
a pulsating mass, while from the girl’s lips, which moved 
from time to time, no sound came to mar the silence of the 
warm, flower-scented atmosphere. 

In fragrant quietude the morning hours melted into noon, 


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143 


and Mary knelt on, so statue-still in her white gown beneath 
the green shadow of the branching palms, that even the 
striking of mid-day and the sharp roll of a carriage beneath 
the windows failed to rouse her from her reverie. 

“Lady St. Cyprien — Lady Theo Bellastier,” announced 
a servant, and amid a rustle of silken skirts the ladies swept 
into the room. 

With a violent start and a hot flush staining her fair skin, 
Mary sprang to her feet with the look and motion of a child 
caught in an act of disobedience. 

“I hope you got my note yesterday, dear,” cried Lady 
St. Cyprien, as she picked her way among the flower-laden 
tables and broad low chairs towards Mary, who stood in the 
shadows like a pale lily tinged with a golden-green. “ St. 
Cyprien was not well, and I could not leave him, even to 
take you to Mr. Mayne’s studio. But are you not ready 
for the Park? It’s much nicer out than it looks, but — 
what is the matter?” 

Lady St. Cyprien gazed with loving, anxious eyes at 
Mary, who, as the startled blush died from her face, grew 
as white as her gown. 

“ Have you a headache, Mary? You are so pale, and your 
hands and lips burn like fire.” 

Lady Theo, who had been winning heavily at the card- 
table till five in the morning, and felt horribly seedy and 
plain, involuntarily wondered if Mary, too, had kept late 
hours. 

“ I am not ill, dear Lady St. Cypmien, but — I cannot go 
to the Park this morning,” said Mary in a low, constrained 
manner. 

“Just as you please, my dear,” said Lady St. Cyprien 
with admirable good humour and tact, for her eyes and ears 
had caught at once the signs of overstrained nerves in the 
bearing of the girl. “ We will give up the Park for to-day. 


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In fact, I think you show very commendable discretion, 
Mary, in not draining dry at the very commencement of the 
season the rather over-estimated delights of church parade. 
Few girls of your age have any sense of restraint. But as 
you must have some air, we’ll forsake the haunts of fash- 
ionable man and woman, and go north and make an explor- 
ation of Hampstead.” 

Lady Theo was looking as yellow as a duck’s foot, and 
the glory of her fine eyes was for the time so hopelessly 
dimmed by late hours, bad air, and excitement, that she in 
her heart desired nothing better than to temporarily avoid 
her fellow-kind, and she endorsed Lady St. Cyprien’s sug- 
gestion at the top of her high-pitched voice. 

But Mary shook her blond head. 

I cannot drive to-day, thank you. I do not wish to 
leave the house. ” 

The little catch of smothered emotion in her voice as she 
spoke, and the twisting and untwisting of her slender fingers 
among the folds of her white crepe gown, warned the 
Countess that an hysterical outbreak was threatening. 

Lady St. Cyprien’s dark eyes peered in vain beneath the 
shadow of the broad palm leaves. She could only catch the 
oval outline of the pale face and the scarcely suppressed 
twitch of the childish mouth. 

Suddenly a great splash of brilliant sunshine, all the 
more harshly intense by contrast with the rolling purple 
clouds, flooded the room and bathed the girl from head to 
foot in a very sea of golden glory. 

With the rending of the veil of merciful verdant twilight, 
the last remnant of Mary’s self-control fell from her, and 
Lady St. Cyprien was shocked to see the convulsed face and 
trembling form rocking and heaving before her in all the 
pitiless glare of the sharp, high light. 

To continue to feign an ignorance of Mary’s hysterical 


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145 


condition was impossible j but the shocked surprise of Lady 
St. Cyprien’s face gave the girl an impression that her 
friend still purposed to make her go out for a drive. 

I cannot leave home to-day,’’ she gasped, in a strangled 
voice. “ I dare not go— the Angel— the Vision— it might 
appear again — I ” 

Lady St. Cyprieii drew herself up to the full extent of 
her stately height, and set her gentle voice to its sternest 
key. 

“Mary, you are giving way to absurd ideas, and encour- 
aging yourself in ridiculous fancies. Theo, fetch the salts 
from Mary’s room; they are always on her dressing-table. 
Angels! Visions! Do you know, my dear, you are talking 
nonsense — and quite wicked nonsense into the bargain? 
Now, don’t let me hear any more about such rubbish.” 

It hurt her intensely to speak sharply to her T>^otegee; 
but the principle which actuates every woman of the world 
to cling in life or death to her fetish, “self-control,” and an 
earnest desire to combat the girl’s neurotic tendencies, 
urged her to such ungracious speech. 

With a supreme effort of will Mary forced her face into 
some semblance of quiescence, but the heavy tears gathered 
in her eyes, and she held two fluttering little hands out to 
her friends. 

“ Don’t be angry with me. You would not if you only 
knew. It is no fancy that has come to me — no dream or 
vain imagining. The truth is no chimera, a promise is not 
to be broken ; and the truth and the promise were given me 
to-day at the moment of the dawn.” 

The shed tears glistened on her cheeks and the laces at 
her throat like diamonds. The outstretched hands ceased 
to fluttering meek supplication, her voice grew steady as 
with a great purpose. 

“ Let me tell you, my dearest friend — my almost mother 
10 


146 


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— of the wonderful thing which has come to me : a thing so 
marvellous, that I am joyful j a thing so mysterious, that 1 
am frightened. Sit, Lady Theo, sit, and I will tell you.” 

A fever burned brightly in her cheeks ; her eyes, gener- 
ally so placid and grave, shone like twin stars. In the 
clear sunlight she stood, with her hands folded before her, 
and in low tones, like one who talks in dreams, she spoke. 

“ I had slept, oh ! so soundly, all the niglit through. I 
had not dreamt; I do not think I had stirred. Yet I awoke 
very suddenly, as though a voice or a touch had startled 
me. I did not move — and I did not even wonder why I 
woke. The soft grey of daybreak was gleaming in faint 
silver lines about the edges of the curtains. It was quite 
early, and all the Avorld seemed to be waiting and watching 
with me. A soulful peace, an intense stillness of antici- 
pation filled my whole being. Time and the sense of living 
slipped from me. I could have waited through eternity. 
Then as the day-dawn flushed to a fuller strength, and filled 
my room with pearly gleams and shifting shadows, the 
Message came.” 

She closed her eyes and sighed in the intensity of her 
beatitude. A smile of divinest happiness curved her mouth, 
and her lips stirred in inaudible thanksgiving. 

Lady St. Cyprien would have started from her chair but 
that Lady Theo, wide-eyed and a little awestruck, laid one 
hand on her arm. 

‘‘Hush, Adela! let Mary finish.” 

Mary spoke again, always in low, short sentences and 
with closed eyes as though she saw again the Vision of the 
Dawn. 

“They grew, those two figures, from mere nothingness. 
I looked, and they were not there; I looked again, and they 
were there. One knelt, with low-bowed head and meek 
crossed hands. The hair was very fail’;, and glinted like 


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147 


pale gold where the light caught it. It knelt on, and prayed. 
Like the sigh of a summer breeze, the prayer swept to my 
ears. It was a prayer for forgiveness, for mercy, for re- 
demption. It was the prayer of millions of sinners, the 
prayer of a lost nation, the prayer of one weak girl. It 
throbbed, and rose, and fell like the murmur of a sea, till 
it filled the whole room, and beat in saddest supplication 
against my very heart.” 

From beneath her lowered lashes two tears slipped down 
her cheeks. 

“ Yet the figure never moved. It prayed on and on — 
always for mercy and for redemption — and as I heard and 
watched, the dawn grew brighter. Then a great Presence 
came, grand, awful, yet formless. The light of all the stars 
shone about it, the odours of white lilies filled the air, and 
from the lilies and the light came a voice. ‘Hail!’ it cried 
like a silver bell. ‘Hail! thou to whom the messenger of 
mercy is sent. Blessed art thou among women.’ Then — 
ah! then the most wonderful thing of all happened — she 
who had prayed and importuned so long, did lift her face 
up towards the angel^and — and — the face was that of the 
picture — it was the face of — myself.” 

The girl’s voice had grown shrill with nervous excite- 
ment as she finished, and she staggered forward into Lady 
St. Cyprien’s arms, utterly overcome with emotion. 

“Open the window, Theo — get some water.” 

Lady Theo, with her pert face preternaturally grave, 
obeyed, and in a few minutes Mary roused from her exhaus- 
tion and smiled wanly. Then Lady St. Cyprien walked 
across to the dying fire and stared with sombre eyes into 
the cooling ashes. She was more moved than she chose to 
admit — even to her common-sense self — by the girl’s story. 
Not that she believed in it for one moment, but she noted 
the (jonvictioii with which Mary regarded it, and the hold 


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which tho self-imagined idea had taken of her. Des^jite her 
own peculiarly unimaginative temperament, and practical 
worldliness, she had sufficient sympathy with youth to 
make all allowance for the heart fancies and soulful ambi- 
tions of the young people of her acquaintance. That a 
young man should desire a maiden for the colour of her hair, 
or the shape of her mouth, she could understand; that a 
girl shoud flout a coronet and diamonds for the beaux yeux 
of a soldier or the suave tongue and empty pockets of a 
barrister, was foolish — but natural, and oh ! so very easily 
cured and so easily understood. 

But the mystical yearnings, the vaguely voiced desires of 
this beautiful Jewish girl, were strange and almost un- 
canny. Lady St. Cyprien had the siiicerest, deepest love 
for Mary Levinge, but her origin and the race from v/hich 
she sprang had no part in that love, and the indefinite de- 
sires which Mary sometimes evinced for the welfare of her 
own people, were in the Countess’s eyes mere girlish 
sentimentalities, which should be quickly eradicated. 

That Mary was still clinging to her childish fancies was 
vexatious. Hysteria was bad for the. health, and neurotic 
whims fatal to the appearance and temper of a young lady. 
Lady St. Cyprien had always hoped for a happy girlhood 
and delightful marriage for her favourite. How could 
either be accomplished under existing circumstances? 

And now there was Theo, who was always excitable, 
overstrung and feverishly on the lookout for new sensations, 
questioning Mary. 

“ Where did this Manifestation take place?” she was ask- 
ing in an awestruck voice. “Show me the exact spot. It 
ju iy appear again.” 

Mary rose quickly, her eyes alight with fervour, her 
whole body quivering with responsive excitement. 

^‘Theo, I am ashamed of you,” cried Lady St. Cyprien 


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149 


sharply, turning from tlie fire. “ You should know better 
than to encourage Mary. She is not well, and this picture 
of Bawdon’s and all the talk she hears at the studio about 
art and religion upset her.’^ 

Then she turned again to Mary, and with firm, kindly 
hands tried to force her back into her chair. 

How can you be fit to continue your sittings to Mr. 
Mayne, if you permit yourself such disturbing fancies? 
Remember, my dear, that a nervous, highly wrought model 
will not at all fulfil Mr. Bawdon’s notion of the fitness of 
things. ” 

But her words fell on deaf ears. Mary, with her eyes 
ablaze with excitement and followed by Lady Theo, whose 
sallow cheeks were quite scarlet, slipped from the Countess’s 
restraining hands and went into the bedroom and with rever- 
ence indicated the very spot where the Vision had been. 

Lady Theo stared hard as though she expected the Mani- 
festation to appear again. 

‘‘Ah! Mary!” she cried ecstatically, clasping her small, 
well-gloved hands. “ I think it must be coming again. I 
can smell the scent of the lilies.” 

Lady St. Cyprien’s face grew very hard and stern, and 
nothing but the enraptured look in Mary’s eyes stayed the 
angry words that rose to her lips. 

Suddenly her eyes caught a crushed spray of lilies of the 
valley on the edge of the dressing-table. 

“Here are your lilies, Theo,” she cried, catching up the 
sickly smelling blossoms. “A bunch of dead rubbish. 
Mary, my dear girl, the thoughts of your portrait, the glit- 
ter of the dawn on your cut glass scent-bottles, and a few 
faded flowers are at the bottom of your vision. Don’t let me 
hear any more about it. Come along Theo, I will drive you 
home — and Mary, keep quiet this afternoon and try to sleep. 
You will not be fit for anything all the week, if you do not.” 


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WITHOUT SIN 


But once ill tlie cari-iHge tlie Countess lapsed into thought- 
ful silenee, and Lady Theo addressed her twice before she 
could get a reply. 

“Well, iny dear, well! What is it you want to 
know?” 

“About Mary,” said Lady Theo, in a rather subdued 
nianner. “Is she — is she quite right, do you think?” 

Lady St. Cyprien turned sharply on her companion. 

“ Theo, never suggest — never even insinuate anything 
against Mary Levinge. The girl is as pure as an angel, and 
as good as gold. Her lonely and uncongenial surroundings 
have encouraged her rather in this fancy about the Madonna, 
and the business of this picture, which I do not like at all, 
have reawakened a childish whimsey. But once give her 
healthy objects in life, an affectionate husband — and, please 
God— ^a little child, and Mary will be the happiest and 
sanest woman in England.” 

A serious expression was the most unbecoming thing in 
the world to Lady Theo Bellastier, and she knew it, but for 
the life of her she could not force a smile to her lips as she 
said timidly : 

“ But, Adela, suppose Mary should not be fanciful at all. 
You needn’t look so cross about it; but you know that the 
Jews consider the prophecy about the coming of a Redeemer 
has yet to be fulfilled. If such a child is to be born, some 
one must be its mother, you know ; and Mary ” 

“I insist, Theo, that you shall not pursue this crazy 
notion, any further. Besides, who ever heard of a miracle 
nowadays?” 

“It does not follow that there should not be one,” was 
Lady Theo’s parting shot as she alighted at her door in 
Wilton Place. 

That same afternoon Martin Baird called to see Mary. 

The gloaming shadows filled the great house as he passed 


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151 


uiiatteiuled up the stairs, and softly tapped at the door of 
her sitting-room. 

It was opened from within. Tall, and like a pale spirit, 
the girl stood against the dim, rich background. 

“ I cannot speak with you to-night. 1 must be alone. 
Only, Martin, pray for me!” 

The sweet low voice floated out, and a white hand fluttered 
towards him through the gloom. Then tht door was gently 
closed and he stood a lonely figure in the dark corridor. 

And she went back to her vigil in the dim room, where 
only the pale twin faces of herself and the picture gleamed 
whitely. 


CHAPTER XVII 


Early in July Mary Levinge gave her last sitting to 
Eliot Mayne for the picture of the Immaculate Conception. 
As a portrait the work was perfectly faithful, as a picture 
Mr. Erastus Bawdon and the leading art critics pronounced 
it a masterpiece of realism in art and fulfilment. 

Following the traditions of the pre-Raphaelite school 
Mayne had not robed his Virgin in costly embroideries and 
heavy velvets, nor posed her in a marble court amid carven 
pillars. In the middle of a small bare room, in the very 
heart of a river of sunshine, which poured through a narrow 
slit in the rough clay wall, sat the girl, her long, slim limbs 
clad only in a shapeless garment of white woollen. The 
brilliant sunlight shone like molten gold through the waxen 
lilies that surrounded her, and glowed rose-red across the 
delicately arched bare feet. Her unbound hair, pale yellow 
about the temples and ruddy auburn in the shadows, fell 
round her shoulders. Translucent and intangible, the angel 
Gabriel floated in the sunlight. A white dove hung on out- 
spread wings between the angel and the Virgin. 

As time had passed Mary had approached each sitting in 
a spirit of extraordinary reverence, which Eliot Mayne had 
at first been inclined to consider as nothing more than the 
affected pose of a rather hysterical girl. But as the weeks 
went by his opinion changed, and the more spiritual side of 
his unstable nature caught the infection of her fervour. 

“The picture had need be good,” he said one evening to 
Mr. Erastus Bawdon, as the artist, smoking au uncompromis- 


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153 


ing pipe and the dilettante amateur a dainty, gold-tipped 
cigarette, stood before the easel. “ The picture had need 
be good, for I have painted my very soul into it. Miss 
Levinge’s individuality is very strong, and she has endowed 
the subject with a peculiar reality, which I don’t mind con- 
fessing to you now, Bawdon, it never held for me before.” 

Mr. Erastus Bawdon’ s heavy face assumed a somewhat 
shocked expression. 

“ I mean no irreverence to the foundation of the Christian 
belief, but simply that, except from a purely artistic point 
of view, the motive of the Annunciation never appealed to 
me at all. It always was limited in my eyes to a mere 
allegory.” 

The artist flung himself into his favourite chair, and with 
his eyes still fixed on the picture said presently : 

“ Tell me, Bawdon, what made you settle upon Miss 
Levinge as a true type for your Virgin? Lady Theo Bellas- 
tier is a charming little woman, and her parties are fairly 
good fun, as parties go nowadays, but hers is scarcely the 
house in which one would expect to find a saint.” 

Erastus Bawdon slowly took a seat before he answered. 

‘‘Initially the girl’s face attracted me,” he began, in his 
deep, rolling tones. “Without being either classically 
beautiful or insipidly pretty, it is extraordinarily attractive, 
being pure in outline and charming in colouring, it somewhat 
pale. But it was not until I looked at her a second time 
that I saw beneath the delicate formation of nose and the 
striking width of brow the spirit which dominated her lile 
and set her apart from other women, as being worthy to be 
the model for the Mary. I felt that the martyred saints 
had thought her thoughts, and had looked at the world with 
such eyes as hers.” 

“ Her features are wonderfully like those of Botticelli’s 
Holy Virgin in tlie National Gallery, but Miss Levinge has 


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at times more strength of expression than one can ever find 
in that lovely face. She told me the other day, though, 
that she has always been considered very like a small pic- 
ture ill Botticelli’s earlier manner, which came into her 
grandfather’s possession, and which she now has, and seems 
to prize beyond everything.” 

“ I have seen the picture, ” said Bawdoii. “ It is a very 
beautiful, though entirely unsigned bit of work. The like- 
ness Miss Levigne speaks of is quite remarkable — or rather 
was. Miss Levinge has not looked well lately.” 

Mayne knocked the ashes out of his pipe, and drew a 
cloth over the picture before he answered. 

“I am not surprised,” he said. “If you could only see 
her sometimes when she is posing, you would wonder that 
she is not really ill. She will sit immovable upon that stage 
of mine with her loosened hair, and her flower-filled hands, 
and those peculiarly shaped eyes of hers fixed wherever I 
tell her. Then after a time her whole face becomes trans- 
figured. She seems as though she were entranced, and were 
herself in truth beholding a vision and enduring the suffer- 
ings of the Virgin Mother. More than once I have had to 
touch her to rouse her from her condition of intense feeling. 
Sometimes it has been as though I were gazing at the first 
scene of the World’s Tragedy. No wonder the girl looks 
worn and ill — I know that I myself am exhausted after 
the sittings. I shall not be sorry when the picture is 
finished.” 

Mr. Erastus Bawdon lifted the veil and took on more look 
at the canvas. 

“ I think, ” he said reflectively, “ that Miss Levinge will 
one day become converted to the true faith. It would be a 
triumph. She shall be received in my church.” 

Then he left. 

And now the last sitting, a very short one, was ended. 


WITHOUT SIN 


165 


aiul Mary Leviiige sto(3d before the picture which mingled 
art and fervour had evolved. 

“It is very beautiful. It touches me to the soul,” she 
said quietly. “But, Mr. Mayne, am I really like that? I 
have always thought of myself as being like that other pic- 
ture of which I have told you. But this face seems strangely 
unfamiliar. Am I like that?” 

Eliot Mayne looked from the picture to the white-robed 
girl who stood before it. 

“Yes,” he said presently. “You are like this. Yet, 
now I come to think of it, I have touched the face often 
lately. Your expression is more etherealized than when you 
first sat, four months ago. It is as if you had so absorbed 
the sensations of the Virgin Mary into your own being, that 
the shadows and lines of approaching sorrow had painted 
themselves about your eyes and mouth.” 

The girl’s lips began to work nervously, and her eyes to 
fill with tears. 

“My dear child!” said Mayne, unaffectedly moved by 
her emotion and laying a gentle hand on Mary’s shoulder. 
“ You have taken this picture loo much to heart, and over- 
strained yourself during the sittings. Your artistic anxie- 
ties to help me in my work have told on your nerves.” 

Then he gave her a kindly smile, and went on in a brighter 
tone : 

“ Besides, you are not saying good-bye to the picture for 
ever, you know. Mr. Bawdon hopes you will see it often 
in the future. He has great dreams of converting you — 
ah, that makes you smile. That’s right, that’s right. 
Mouths like yours are made for laughter,” he said lightly, 
returning to his rather artificial manner. “ Grief on a 
young face looks out of place.” 

So Mary, with a wan smile about her mouth, and her 
tears forced back in their channels, left with her maid Eliot 


156 


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Mayne’s dim, cool house on Campdeii Hill and drove through 
the fret aud steam and heat ol theffuly noon, by the crowded 
Kensington High Street and through the already parched 
alleys of the Paik, to Knightsbridge and Lowndes Square. 

“Her ladyship will be in to luncheon at two,” said Lady 
St. Cyprien’s butler, as he ushered Mary into th^ perfumed 
dusk of the boudoir, which lay at the back of the big 
drawing-rooms. 

The windows were so closely darkened, and so great was 
the contrast to the glaring streets, that had she not known 
the room well, Mary must have felt her way among the 
furniture As it was, she crept softly into the depths of a 
cool, chintz-covered chair. A great weariness of body fell 
on her as she half sat, half lay among the cushions, and 
again the unaccountable desire to cry, which had almost 
choked her in the studio, swept over her. With a scarcely 
suppressed sob, she bowed her face among the cold, velvety 
petals of a bowl of yellow roses which stood next her chair. 
Two tears, that sc orched her eyelids as they came, fell on 
the dew-laden blossoms. 

She was on the verge of a burst of weeping, when the 
firm, quick steps of a man rang through the empty drawing- 
rooms. 

“Miss Levinge, where have you hidden yourself in this 
Cimmerian gloom?” cried Lord Stansdale’s cheery voice 
from the curtained doorway, “ Ford told me you were up 
here, but I certainly can’t see you.” 

Mary brushed her handkerchief across her burning eyes, 
and after a moment said in a faint voice : 

“I am here, Lord Stansdale.” 

“ Ah ! I can guess your whereabouts now — you are in 
Aunt Adela’s big chair by the piano. Well, I will come 
over to you - if T can.” 

But whether by accident or design, Lord Stansdale moved 


WITHOUT SIN 


157 


in the direction of the windows, and suddenly raising an 
outer blind, let in a Hood of hot, white light. 

Mary gave a little cry, and placed her hands before her 
eyes. 

“Too much glare, eh?” said Stansdale. “Well, ITl try 
half measures.” He quickly lowered the blinds till a tender 
twilight filled the little room. Then he went over to Mary 
and sat down. 

He was sincerely in love with her, and for a moment was 
content to gaze at her. 

She had pulled off her hat on entering the room, and it 
lay, a dainty mass of white tulle and filmy lace, in her lap. 
Her hair was a little ruffled, and had fluffed itself into a 
cloud of disorderly pale-gold curls about her brows and ears. 
The uncertain light hid, even from love’s eyes, all traces of 
emotion. 

Stansdale thought she looked very sweet, and the phlegm 
of his English nature was stirred. He felt the necessity of 
urging his suit bubbling to his lips. 

“Let me put your hat down somewhere. Miss Levinge,” 
he began, taking it from her lap. “ How some women con- 
trive to impress their personality on the things they wear! 
Do you know, I could never bear white until I saw you in 
it? It al ways seems too cold and expressionless for ordinary 
women, but for you ” 

He paused. Sincere compliments did not trip easily from 
his reticent tongue. 

“I cannot imagine you in anything else.” 

Mary uttered an idly interrogative “No?” 

She entertained a genuine friendship for Lady St. 
Cyprien’s handsome nephew. She liked his company, and 
looked for his attendance at dances, the Opera, and in the 
Park. That he regarded her with feelings any different 
from her own had never seriously occurred to her, though 


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more than once she had deprecated the Countess’s hints 
that Lord Stansdale would make her a suitable husband. 

So, with never a flutter at her heart, or a quickening flush 
in her cheeks, she lay back in Lady St. Cyprien’s chair, 
with half-closed eyes and wandering thoughts. A touch on 
her hand, a new, a deeper tone in her companion’s voice 
roused her to a sense of what was coming. 

“ Miss Levinge— Mary— I have for so long admired you — 
latterly I have learned to love. Your sweetness and your 
beauty make you worthy of any position the world can offer 
you. Will you take the one that I can give you? Will 
you be my wife?” 

Lord Stansdale spoke awkwardly. The inherent shyness 
of his race and cultivated reserve of his class tied his tongue. 
True love surged from his heart to his throat, but could get 
no further. Yet feebly as his desires were conveyed Mary 
understood him. He wished to marry her. The physical 
disgust she had felt at Eugene Cohen’s proposal did not over- 
take her now. She was overwhelmed with a great wave 
of pity — for herself and for him — that she could not bring 
her lips to frame a “ Yes!” or her hands to return his clasp. 

She shook her head. 

1 cannot marry you, although, believe me. Lord Stans- 
dale, I am sensible of the honour you are doing me.” 

“You do not love me, then!” he cried, his passion rising 
at the check. “ But do not refuse me now. Let me love 
you for a little time, let me be your servant, your slave, till 
one day you will care for me, and your regard grows to love. 
Then I will ask you again for your hand and for your heart, 
and you will be mine.” 

He essayed to clasp her hands, but she rose and for a 
moment eluded him. 

“ Ah ! Lord Stunsdale, if T could choose a husband from 
among all men, 1 would have you.” 


WITHOUT SIN 


159 


He sprang towards her, but she slipped from him again. 

“ But I entreat you not to wait, not to hope.” 

She spoke in a broken voice. If she could only put her 
fears and longings and doubts from her, if she could only 
give herself and her future to this debonair gentleman, with 
his frank, blue eyes and strong, kind hands. The fierce 
longing for happiness which comes to all young things over- 
whelmed her for a moment. 

Unconsciously, and with half-closed eyes, she surged like 
a breaking lily towards him. With a cry of joy, he caught 
her to his heart, and rained a hundred kisses on her pale 
face. 

“Oh! no! no! you mistake — leave me — I — ” came in 
gasps from the girPs lips. 

With frail hands set against his breast she tried to free 
herself from his embrace. 

“My love! my sweetest love! my wife!” murmured 
Stansdale passionately in her reluctant ears. 

Then childish tears came, and he was about to loose her 
when Lady St. Cyprien entered quickly. Her woman’s wit, 
and the knowledge of Mary Levinge’s coy aversion to mar- 
riage, gave her the key to the situation. 

“Stansdale and Mary,” she cried. “My dear boy— a 
thousand congratulations. Your uncle will be delighted. 

Mary ” she took the girl from Stansdale’s arms and, 

clasping her to her own heart, kissed her very tenderly— 
“ Mary, my dearest, dearest child— you have made me the 
happiest woman in London.” 

There were tears in her voice and in her dark eyes as she 
placed the girl in a chair and began to soothe her. 

“ Now my dear, do not talk — I can guess all you would 
say. Stansdale has loved you for months but has feared to 
speak. Now I am glad the secret is told. He will have 
the loveliest and the best wife in the world, and you will 


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find what you deserve— a loyal heart, a true friend — and 
that best of all blessings for a woman — an affectionate 
husband.” 

For a moment Mary looked from Lady St. Cyprien to 
Lord Stansdale. Then with a faint sigh, half of weariness, 
half of happiness, she let her hands fall in her lap. Per- 
haps marriage with a good man was her destiny after all. 
Perhaps all the rest was but futile longing. 

She sighed again, a long sobbing sigh, that shook her 
frame. Her lifetime’s dreams were shattered, dispelled, 
gone. She turned her face to Lady St. Cyprien to be 
kissed, and then held out one hand to her lover. 

The rest of the day was passed in a whirl. Lady St. 
Cyprien, who plumed herself on having turned the scale of 
Mary’s wandering decision, for the girl’s ultimate benefit, 
felt that the next best thing was to give her no time for 
reflection. With the kindest motives therefore she drove 
her out during the afternoon, sent for her maid and an 
evening gown from Holmhurst to Lowndes Square, super- 
intended her toilette, took her to the opera and a couple of 
crushes, and only left her at her own door, numbed with 
bewilderment and aching with fatigue, at two o’clock the 
next morning. 


CHAPTER XVIII 


It was late when Mary awoke in the morning. The 
flame which burnt beneath the chocolate pot at her bedside 
had flickered out long ago, and the jug for hot milk when 
she touched it was stone cold. 

She rang her bell sharply and then dropped back among 
her pillows. In spite of her hours of heavy, dreamless 
sleep, she ached dully in all her limbs, and her eyes and 
head were heavy and hot. Too tired to remember, too 
physically weary to think of aught but her own discomfort, 
she did not move till the maid brought in some fresh choco- 
late, and after having poured it out, laid the morning’s post 
and newspapers on the bed. 

Sipping at the chocolate, Mary with idle fingers turned 
over her letters. None were of interest till the sixth and 
last. As she caught sight of the crest and coronet, and the 
bold, square superscription on the cover, she put down her 
cup with a clatter, and with dilated eyes and burning cheeks 
stared at the thick cream -tinted envelope. 

Then it all came back to her ; that scene in the shaded, 
cool boudoir, where among the roses and the old-fashioned 
chintzes. Lord Stansdale had wooed her and clasped her 
hands and kissed her lips. She dashed angry, quivering 
fingers across her mouth at the recollection. 

And then Lady St. Cyprien had come in, and in another 
moment, almost without her knowledge, all had been settled. 

“ They mean it for the best, but are they right? Am I 
wrong?” she sighed. 

11 


162 


WITHOUT SIN 


With weary indifference she opened her other letters, but 
the seal of Lord Stansdale’s envelope remained unbroken. 
Perhaps it was a last faint hope that her engagement might 
not be irrevocably binding that prevented her, in honour, 
from reading the love vows of a man she might after all 
not marry. 

With equal lack of interest she turned to the Morniiuj 
Post and glanced down the columns of the centre page. 
The two big parties she had attended the previous evening 
were mentioned, and the fixtures for the coming day were 
duly set forth with formal particularity. Then came a 
separate paragraph, in the leaded type which is generally 
reserved for special news. 

“ We are authorised to state that a marriage has been 
arranged, and will shortly take place, between Viscount 
Stansdale, of 99 Curzon Street, and The Dales, Yorkshire, 
and Miss Mary Levinge, of Holmhurst, Regent’s Park.” 

She read the announcement through three times, very 
slowly. It did not strike her to question who had sent it 
to the paper, or even to cavil at it being there. It was 
made, that was enough. 

Quite quietly, and with no shadow of emotion, no signs 
of maidenly modesty, or joy, or grief marring the pale 
tranquillity of her face, she laid the paper aside and took 
up Lord Stansdale’ s letter. 

He was to be her husband, she was to be his wife — the 
affair was settled. Now she might read what he had to 
say. 

It was a chivalrous, manly letter, breathing as much 
gratitude as love, and more sincere devotion than either. 
It was very short and simple. Most girls whose heads are 
filled with idealisms would have called it bald and cold, 


WITHOUT SIN 


163 


but for Mary it was sufficient. The very simplicity and 
straightforwardness of expression appealed to her and 
touched her more than a thousand fulsome compliments 
and passionate asseverations would ever have done. 

With Stansdale’s letter in her hand Mary Levinge 
dropped the curtain on the past. The vague aspirations of 
her childhood’s days, dreamed amid the relics of all time in 
the Art Gallery, the more fully formulated desires of later 
years, she put behind her with hands that trembled though 
they never faltered. 

With her lover’s words of truth and loyalty before her, 
she faced the future. She would strive to be a wife worthy 
of his station and affection. 

‘‘Pray God give me strength!” she murmured with 
clasped hands. 

Then she rose, and thrusting her little feet into soft 
white slippers, she crossed the room. 

Suddenly a great shock thrilled her from head to foot. 

An irrepressible ciw of terror broke from her lips, her 
face was distorted with a mighty fear. 

Again— and yet once again! 

Then all grew dark, and with pale hands fighting the 
overwhelming waters of her fate, she fell on her knees and 
prayed. 


wriAPTEK XTA 


Lady St. Cyprien and her maid were half-way through 
that careful toilette which made the former pre-eminent 
among the best-dressed women of the day, when a pencilled 
note was brought into her dressing-room. 

“I must see you at once. — M ary.” 

Lady St. Cyprien smiled a little as she read the hastily 
scribbled words. 

“ She’s seen the announcement in the Post, of course, and 
is a little put out, I dare say. It was sharp practice on my 
part, I admit, but she is such an undecided creature that 
she wants some one to make up her mind for her. How 
she’ll bless me by the time she’s been six months married.” 

Then she turned to the waiting servant. 

“ Tell Miss Levinge’s messenger I will be at Holmhurst 
in less than an hour. And order the victoria round as 
quickly as possible.” 

Lady St. Cyprien was fully prepared to cope with Mary’s 
girlish arguments against the publicly announced engage- 
ment and a speedy marriage. She intended to treat all 
scruples as mere caprice, which a little affectionate firmness 
would quickly override. She was therefore rather put out 
to hear from the servant who admitted her that Miss 
Levinge was still in her room. 

“Miss Levinge is not ill, I hope,” she said anxiously. 

“ I do not know, milady. Nobody has seen Miss Levinge 
this morning but her maid. Carter.” 


WITHOUT SIN 


165 


Lady St. Cyprien passed quickly up the broad shallow 
stairs, and a moment later was standing in Mary’s bedroom. 

With her hair still unbrushed and tossed in flaxen masses 
about her shoulders, her feet bare, and only a loose white 
wrapper pulled round her, Mary sat pale and mute in a 
deep chair. 

She gave a long sigh of satisfaction as Lady St. Cpyrien 
entered, but neither spoke nor moved, and it was her visitor 
who first broke the silence. 

“ My dearest child, you sent for me, and I have come. 
What is the matter? Are you vexed about the announce- 
ment in the papers? You know such news is always put 
about at once. People like to hear it.” 

But no word came from the silent, seated figure. 

Certainly she must be ill. Lady St. Cyprien looked at 
her and gradually became filled with the consciousness of 
some subtle sudden change in the girl’s face and bearing. 
The well-cut features, the pure eyes, the sweet expression 
were unaltered, yet there was a difference since yesterday. 

“ Are you not well? Is anything the matter? Speak, 
Mary.” 

A growing fear that the girl was mentally, if not physi- 
cally, ill, lent a unusual sharpness to Lady St. Cyprien’ s 
voice. 

Mary rose slowly, lifting herself by pressing her hands 
upon the arms of the chair, as though a great weakness or 
a new fragility had come upon her. 

“I cannot marry Lord Stansdale.” 

She spoke very quietly, permitting herself neither any 
gesture nor display of emotion. Her arms hung straightly 
at her sides, but her head was proudly set, and she looked 
at the Countess with eyes that never faltered or quailed. 

“ Mary, I do not understand ; I cannot permit you, for a 
mere whim, to wreck ” 


166 


WITHOUT SIN 


“1 cannot marry Lord Stansdale.’' 

Low and steady the girl’s incisive words cut across the 
other’s agitated tones. 

Lady St. Cyprien drew nearer, her keen dark eyes search- 
ing every I'eature of Mary’s impassive face, every outline 
of her slender form, as though she would force her reasons 
from her. 

Suddenly she drew back. Knowledge came to her, and 
she understood. 

A look of divinest pity — the purest sympathy that one 
woman can feel for another — swept over her face. She 
opened her arms wide. 

‘‘Mary, my darling, my poor, poor child,” she cried. 

Ani Mary, with a little sob, crept like a tired child to 
her heart, and the two women wept togethei’. 

Mary was the first to repress her emotion. With a 
dignity that was pathetic in its forced self-control she with- 
drew herself from Lady St. Cyprien’s arms, and, brushing 
the last tears from her lashes, said, for the third time, “ I 
cannot marry Lord Stansdale.” 

Lady St. Cyprien in her turn dried her eyes, but, though 
all outward signs of grief were suppressed, her face was 
aged and drawn with a look of infinite sorrow as she led 
Mary back to her chair and seated herself beside her. 

And in truth Lady St. Cyprien had cause enough to 
grieve, though after the first moment she dwelt no longer 
on the disappointment the broken engagement would be to 
Stansdale, Lord St. Cyprien, and herself. Momentarily it 
was bitter in her mouth, then it was forgotten for ever, 
swallowed up in the greater shock of her discovery. 

Kind-hearted, gentle-souled though she was. Lady St. 
Cyprien had small faith in the virtue of her own class. 
The knowledge had been forced upon her, despite herself, 
ever since the days when she had made her debut into 


WITHOUT SIN 167 

I 

society. But she was herself essentially too clean-minded 
and charitable a woman to gloat over the weaknesses of her 
order. It was sad enough and bad enough to know that all 
wives were not faithful, all daughters pure. 

But in the truth, the modesty and goodness of Mary 
Levinge, sprung from another race, born in another sphere 
of life, she had always believed, and still must do so. 
That Mary, with her high ideals, her slightly fantastic 
notions of purity, should have stooped to an intrigue. Lady 
St. Cyprien felt to be absolutely out of all question. That 
the girl had been trapped seemed equally absurd, for what 
man could be so brute-low as to bring such shame upon so 
sweet a saint? Involuntarily as Lady St. Cyprien realised 
the extent and consequences of so cruel an outrage, she 
clenched her white fingers till the blood started from her 
palms. 

It was the clinging touch of Mary’s small hands that first 
roused her from her agony of rage and grief. 

“Dearest, best of friends. You must not grieve.” 

“But the cruelty of it all. Oh! my poor child, when I 
think of all that is yet to come,” and Lady St. Cyprien, 
growing incoherent in her anger and sorrow, lost the last 
remnant of calm frigidity and wrung her hands. 

“When — when did you realise this thing?” she said 
presently when she could find words. 

“About two hours ago. At first — at first I thought I 
should have died — with joy.” 

Heedless of the horror and alarm which grew in Lady St. 
Cyprien’s dark eyes, Mary went on speaking. 

“For I knew the sign had been vouchsafed to me; that 
all fears and doubts were dispelled for ever; that a nation’s 
supplications were to be answered in God’s good time.” 

She spoke very gently, the Avords dropping so slowly 
from her parting lips that she might have been in dreamland. 


168 


WITHOUT SIN 


Lady St. Cyprien’s voice was husky and rough, and she 
had to clear her throat twice before she could whisper : 

“ What do you mean, Mary?” 

The girl rose to her feet. Her form dilated, her face 
glowed as from an inner fire, her eyes grew mystic as 
though they had gazed into the very heart of heaven itself. 

“ I mean that the God of my forefathers has been good 
and merciful ; that he has hearkened to the prayers of my 
outcast people; that he has vouchsafed the desire of a 
despised race, and that henceforth the love of man is not 
for me. For I am that woman of whom the prophet Isaiah 
has spoken.” 

She raised her round white arms to heaven, and as her 
loose, full sleeves fell back, they gleamed like carven ivory 
in the sunshine. 

I am that maiden who is to be the human link between 
God and man. The miracle of miracles has come to pass. 
A virgin has conceived, and shall bear a son, and shall call 
his name, Immanuel.” 

With wonder and pity filling her heart, Lady St. Cyprien 
left Holmhurst. It was no use to argue. 

That a marriage with her nephew, Stansdale, was out of 
the question she was convinced; but how far Mary’s wild 
words were the chimera of a brain disordered by the terrible 
discovery of the morning, she dared not think. Only of 
one thing was she convinced, on one certainty she would 
stake her very life, Mary herself had not sinned. Of noth- 
ing else was she sure. The whole foundation of her faith 
in virtue and in truth was shaken, though it still stood. 

Absorbed in doubts of past actions, and filled with fears 
for the future. Lady St. Cyprien was driven through the 
close July-parched streets and into the dusty Park. Her 
newest trouble was poor Stansdale. He was to lunch that 
day in Lowndes Square, to meet his betrothed; and in the 


WITHOUT SIN 


169 


chintz-hung boudoir they would have talked of the wedding 
and the honeymoon, the gowns and the jewels, which are 
the glory of matrimony to a young girl. Now that was all 
over, and Lady St. Cyprien sighed very heavily as she 
thought of the blow she had to aim at the heart of the boy 
whom she loved as she would have loved a son, had God 
sent her one. 

‘‘Hallo! Adela. What are you dreaming about? The 
cut of Mary’s wedding gown, or which house in your neigh- 
bourhood you intend the young couple to occupy?” 

Lady Theo’s loud voice rang out from the driver’s seat 
of a smart mail phaeton, which she had pulled up in an 
alarming, if daring fashion, right across the noses of Lady 
St. Cyprien’s horses. 

‘‘A thousand congratulations, dear,” screamed Lady 
Theo, hauling at the mouths of the chestnut cobs she was 
driving, and making them dance, till every link and buckle 
in their harness jingled a silver chorus. “I had meant to 
turn in at Lady Holgate’s last night, and then I suppose, I 
should have heard the news. Only I got stuck up at Kitty 
Vyvyan’s card-table, and I won a bit; so of course I 
couldn’t break my luck. But I saw it in the Fast this 
moining. It’s a perfect match.” 

And having screamed in an ascending key till she had 
reached the limits of even her flexible voice. Lady Theo 
subsided, and waited for an answer. It rather astonished 
her when it came. 

“ Let your man take the cobs home, Theo, and come for 
a walk with me. There’s plenty of time before luncheon. 
It’s not one o’clock yet.” 

Lady St. Cyprien had kept her sunshade so low over her 
head that, beyond catching a rather weary note in her 
always subdued voice, Lady Theo did not guess that any- 
thing was amiss. 


170 


WITHOUT SIN 


But when the two ladies had wandered a little way up 
one of the narrower walks, where the burnt trees Hung 
heavy shadows on the cracked, brown earth. Lady St. 
Cyprien lowered her parasol and dropped heavily on to a 
seat. 

“Heavens! Adela,” cried Lady Theo, with genuine con- 
cern. “Are you not well? There! and my flask is in the 
phaeton. I get so faint myself sometimes, I generally like 
to keep a chasse handy.” 

Lady Theo bounded forward, as though she would have 
pursued her carriage, but Lady St. Cyprien held out a 
detaining hand. 

“Don’t go, Theo,” she cried, weakly. “I am not ill, 
but in great grief. A terrible thing has happened.” 

“I am so sorry, Adela. What is it? Any one ill? St. 
Cyprien, or Stansdale, or Mary? But they were with you 
last night at Holgate House; it can’t be either ” 

“ It is Mary.” 

“ Mary ill ! How very sad !” 

But Lady Theo’s rather conventional platitudes of sym- 
pathy were stayed on her lips by the expression of intense 
sorrow on the older woman’s face. 

“ She — Mary is not dead?” she asked in a low voice. 

“ It is worse than that. It is the worst thing that can 
come to a girl.” 

“Mary like that? Oh! Adela, impossible. You must 
be mad to even suggest such a thing.” 

Lady Theo’s views of life, which, like those of most 
people, were principally governed by personal experiences, 
were scarcely of a charitable order. Her pert nose was a 
very bloodhound’s for scenting out a scandal, and. her wide 
mouth and shrill voice made the most of every good story 
that came her way. But the flner depths of her being, 
which she had done her best to stultify, had always re- 


WITHOUT SIN 


in 


Hpumled to Mary’s purer, higher views. She admired traits 
ill the girl’s character which she would have crushed be- 
neath a scornful heel in her own, while the strong strain of 
ignorant superstition in her nature had always been touched 
by the mystic atmosphere of idealism with which Mary 
sometimes surrounded herself. 

That this pure girl could have fallen as other women of 
all classes had fallen, she believed was impossible, and her 
disclaimer to Adela St. Cyprien was at once hurt and indig- 
nant. 

“ 1 do not say the child has sinned ; God forbid that I or 
any one should cast so heavy a stone at her. Yet it is as 
I have told you. The marriage cannot take place.” 

The Countess’s stately form, which none of her great 
circle had ever known to bend, now bowed and swayed in 
her excess of grief. 

Lady Theo only sat with her big, beautiful eyes fixed on 
the sun-baked ground, and her ugly mouth twisted into an 
inscrutable curve. 

“Adela! Adela! Does Mary account for — explain — ex- 
cuse ?” 

“ I fear the terrible shock of discovery and confession has 
for the time absolutely destroyed her nerves. She made no 
scene; in fact, her quietude and self-assurance, after the 
first breakdown, were inexpressibly painful.” 

“She did not admit anything?” said Lady Theo, with 
eyes still fixed and mouth still contracted. 

“Nothing! She was too full, poor child, of those dreams 
and notions which she has fostered till they have grown to 
be a part of her.” 

“ Those ideas about — about the Virgin Mary, the picture, 
and all that?” 

Adela St. Cyprien nodded. 

The colour crept slowly from Lady Theo’s cheeks, leav- 


172 


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ing her sallow and plain: her mouth twitched nervously, 
and her voice shook so that she could scarcely speak. 

“Adela — Adela,” she hissed out between her labouring 
breaths. “ Do you remember what Mary told us that Sun- 
day morning in March? About a vision which she had.” 

‘•1 remember that. But, Theo, surely you — don’t think 
— you cannot connect ” 

Lady Theo caught her friend’s hand. 

“ I think, Adela, that a great miracle is going to happen. 
Perhaps the end of the world. Doesn’t the Bible say some- 
thing about it happening when the second Redeemer comes? 
Ah! Adela, you’ve been a good woman — and Mary is a 
saint, and worthy to be what she is. But I — I’ve been 
bad. I’ve told lies, and betted, and snubbed poor Tom 
shamefully — and I play cards —and once — once — it’s three 
years ago now — I cheated awfully. I’ve been a very 
wicked woman, and now the time of punishment is coming.” 

Her eyes were dilated with terror, as though the eternal 
fires themselves were bursting forth at her feet. She shook 
like a leaf from head to foot. 

“Theo, don’t say such dreadful things,” cried Lady St. 
Cyprien, roused to the necessity of action by the other’s 
condition, which was fast becoming hysterical. “ You must 
come home at once with me. The matter must be faced 
bravely and quietly — for Mary’s sake. It will be all over 
the town in a few days, and God help her then, if some of 
the friends of her childhood do not stand by her.” 

The Row was empty as they crossed to Albert Gate, but 
Lady Belinda Harvey, who drove past them at the corner 
by the French Embassy, on her way to a big luncheon at 
the Bachelors’ Club, told fifty people that afternoon that 
Lady St. Cyprien did not look a bit pleased at her nephew’s 
engagement. 


AN INTERMEZZO 


Lambs wandering through the bushes leave white wool 
upon the thorns. The seagull drops white feathers on the 
darkest furrows. The snowflakes fall in white sheets over 
the Holy Season. The break of hawthorn buds blanch the 
trees: the snowdrops spangle the woods; the cherry and 
pear blossoms crown the gardens when the month of maidens 
is at hand. Even as these, the immaculate soul of Mary, 
ignorant of all but its own purity, made all things white 
about her in the house in which she lived, and weaved and 
wrought, like an angel in the moonlight, placing lilies and 
wax candles in a chapel of alabaster. An atmosphere clear 
as moonlight on sea-foam, wdiite as lilies laid against 
marble, grew about the life of Mary, and filled every corner 
of her heart and home. It was as the halo of her virginity, 
which widened and spread in trembling silver rays that 
reached to the edges of her own domain, and made for her 
a very world of whiteness. 

The velvet hangings, wrought with huge flowers in col- 
oured silks and touched with metal threads, were folded 
aside. Oriental rugs of gaudy hues, and the tawny tiger 
skins were, with the golden bowls and flagons of rejmisse 
work, put out of sight. As the days went by her fancy 
strengthened, till the flare of a colour jarred on her super- 
sensitive nature, and the sound of a rough voice or heavy 
step thrilled her as the blare of brass among the melody of 
strings and wood instruments. 

As the impress of her own purity gi^ew about her, 


174 


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obedient to her impression, Mary surrounded herself only 
with women servants, who, like herself, were dressed in 
white, and, as the ideality of her personality strengthened 
about them day by day, her house became more and more 
like a beautiful nunnery, whei-e the footfalls were always 
light and soft, and the voices sounded low and sweet. It 
became like a quiet, retired place, where the leek of sordid 
sin and common clay never drifted across the threshold. 

When the pale spirit of a new-born day descended upon 
the house, it drifted like a pale ghost into the great white 
hall, where a marble nymph, with a pulseless bosom of 
driven snow, lay in perpetual slumber. Dimly the stair- 
case, all of colourless stone, and balustraded with slender 
columns of silver, rose in white steps up into the shadows 
of the upper floors. In every chamber of the house a white 
avalanche of snowy muslin curtains fell in transparent folds 
before the windows. 

Mary woke amid the pearly shadows of lace hangings, 
the embroidered lilies on which were worked in thick white 
silk. They swung in scentless wreaths above the white 
face the innocent, meek eyes, and pale gold head, which 
lay so motionless among the bleached down pillows and 
foamy laces of the bed. 

The young girl rose at dawn to pray, and walked with 
arched, bare feet, which passed like wind-blown petals of a 
white rose over the warm fleeces of the sheepskin rugs. 
With unbound hair, and her lawn nightdress falling about 
her ill straight pleats, she knelt in the rays of the rising 
sun before the picture of the Virgin, so strangely like her- 
self. 

She kneeled on the steps of white marble, carved at the 
corners with the heads of cherubim, and railed within slight 
pillars of clear agate, through which the sun shot shafts of 
opalescent light. Silver-edged was the altar and three 


WITHOUT SIN 


175 


great carved turquoises of virginal blue were set below the 
flounce of lace that decked the narrow cloth of shining 
silver. The sconces which held the ever-burning candles 
of pure wax sparkled like cut ice. All the room was pale 
and colourless as Chastity herself, save where the giant 
palms flung verdant shadows above the sheaves of Eucharist 
and Mary lilies, and the tiny bells of the valley blossoms, 
which filled the atmosphere with a white mist of per- 
fume. 

Voicelessly and in no set form she prayed; then, rising 
to her feet with the sweet humility of a handmaiden, she 
went to her toilette. The walls of her bath-room were tiled 
with ware of so fine a glaze that they glittered like mother- 
of-pearl shells and dulled the silver fittings, from whence 
rose, like burning incense, perfumed steam, which warmed 
the cooler air, and clung in glittering dew-drops to the sun- 
lit window-panes. 

From her satin shoulders she slipped her simple gown, 
and gave up all the whiteness of her fair body to the em- 
braces of the milky bath, splashing the water over herself 
like a silver statue in a fountain, while the reflected sun 
rays danced like golden fairies upon the polished walls. 

Her bath finished, she hid the more perfect whiteness of 
her skin with clean lavender-perfumed linen, on which the 
little tucks and tiny hems, the pearl, the feather, and the 
coral stitches had all been set by the toil-worn fingers of 
nuns, who prayed as they worked in the garden of a con- 
vent. She brushed her fair hair long and arduously, wav- 
ing the marvellous whiteness of her slender arms, until it 
hung like a great fleece of virgin gold about her shoulders. 
She sat before her dressing table, strewn with clear-cut 
crystal bottles, boxes, and toilet toys of carved ivory. 
Twisting her hair loosely about her head, she bound it with 
a fillet of white riband, in such a fashion that it was as 


176 


WITHOUT SIN 


though a nebulous aureole had been spun out of the sun’s 
gold threads above the strange fairness of her pale face. 

A simple dress of white woollen, ungirdled at the waist, 
like those she had worn when a school-girl, made her look 
tall and slight as a swaying lily. 

Still fasting, she prayed again for a few moments, then 
rose and went to her humble first meal of milk and white 
bread. Napery of old Flemish work, drawn and stitched 
into severely stiff designs, and bleached in the dyked grass- 
lands of quaint Holland, set the table. In the centre was 
placed a silver bowl, brimming with scented plumes of 
white lilac. At the four corners, in trumpet-shaped glasses 
of the clearest crystal, were branches of white roses. They 
almost met above her head as she took her place. The 
ware was white, soft as velvet to the touch, feather light, 
graceful in form, but guileless of all ornament, and simple 
as that which serves a peasant’s table. 

Thence went she to her business about the house, which 
hourly grew in whiteness, as though she were some spirit 
whose passage blanched all things with its wings. 

Once, as she crossed the hall, herself so pale she scarcely 
had a being among the hewn marbles and white hangings, 
the crimson stain of scattered rose-leaves on the stairs 
caught her eyes. She started as though she had seen blood, 
and the shadow of a vague horror clouded her face. And 
yet she spoke very gently, as was her way, to the woman 
who had brought the coloured blossoms across her threshold. 

She spent much time among her linen chests, which 
exhaled the fresh odour of newly dried lavender, and 
satiated her craving for immaculate purity. Her fevered 
fingers passed with lingering touch among the exquisite 
cool cloths of double damask, her long arms dived among 
the table linen from Germany, of fine bleached linen, cut 
away to admit of entre-deux of exquisite old lace, or rare 


WITHOUT SIN 


177 


strips of embroidery. She turned over the Flemish drawn- 
work and the dainty embroideries on the cloths that came 
from Paris, but some fripperies for the tea-table, all frills 
and gaily coloured bows and strips of bright satin, she 
ordered to be taken away. 

When she had strength she moved from shelf to shelf 
the mighty masses of sheets, all of finest Irish linen and 
bordered with hem-stitching, and often edged with lace, 
and she loved to lay her burning cheeks against the princely 
goffered, frilled pillow-cases, and the muslin embroidered 
bolster slips she laid on either side. 

Of flounced and embroidered bedspreads, quilts, pillow 
shams, toilet covers edged with heavy guipure, and un- 
wieldy piles of creamy white blankets, soft and warm to 
the touch as the backs of young lambs, she had endlesa 
stores. 

One corner was set sacredly apart, and in it, among some 
fresh-gathered lavender and a few sweet leaves of lemon 
verbena a pile of little things grew day by day : sheets and 
blankets of such fairy lightness, lawn like a cobweb, lace 
like a film. She scarcely dared to touch them, they were 
so fine and small, and sometimes as she stood before them 
her eyes filled with happy tears. Then with brain that 
ached from the blinding whiteness of the linen, and nostrils 
satiated with the odour of new-mown hay and green hedges, 
among which it had been bleached, her soul sickened for 
more whiteness, for further evidence of purity, for multi- 
plied proofs of innocence, and she wandered out into her 
garden, where all that was stainless of colour in Nature had 
been gathered. 

From her favourite seat she could see and scent the 
flowers she loved the best. The lilies grew in ranks and 
swayed in the breeze like the heads of snowy -hooded nuns 
against the dim grey-green of the clipped yew hedge, above 
12 


178 


WITHOUT SIN 


which a guelder rose tossed its balls of snow in the light 
summer air. Down by the little pond some white irises, 
graceful as curving swan’s necks, heralded the blooming of 
the water-lilies. Two may-trees, like young maidens in 
their first-communion dresses, lavished their sweetest per- 
fume, which was crossed by the acrid odour of the wide- 
eyed marguerites, growing in low tazza-shaped vases along 
the south terrace of the house. The syringa bushes were 
sickly and cloying, with a myriad white buds. The flower- 
beds were virginal with white geraniums, anemones, and 
verbenas. The hedge of homely sweet-peas wdiicli hid the 
kitchen garden was sprinkled as though with snow, and an 
arch, close to the shelter of the drawing-room windows, 
which was overgrown with jasmine and myrtle, was like a 
strip of heaven itself, so thick were the starry blossoms. 

A pair of white hydrangeas, laden with heavy-headed 
blooms, guarded a walk where simple cottage flowers, holly- 
hocks and foxgloves, flox and tall spear-heads of gladioli, 
grew in one drift of snowy beauty. There, too, were tiny 
white pansies, lifting their dainty cat-faces to the sun. Of 
roses there were many, yet all were pure of colour, and 
when they died, white dahlias, pale moon-flowers, and the 
delicate Michaelmas daisy blew in their place. 

In the hothouses hung great bunches of waxen steph- 
anotis, mocking with their exquisite perfume the camellias, 
expressionless and scentless as though carved from frozen 
snow. The azaleas, dazzling in their whiteness and deli- 
cacy, as a girl at her first ball, yet were foiled by the fair- 
ness of a glossy -leaved gardenia, covered with a hundred 
scented blooms. A white heliotrope put forth frail, sweet 
clusters against the wall, and feathery spireas waved their 
clustering cones, while over all, like a huge cup of ivory, 
hung a glorious magnolia, pouring from its inexhaustible 
bowl a mighty flood of matehless fragrance. 


WITHOUT SIN 


179 


Among her flowers, whiter than them all, as fair and as 
innocent and pure as any, Mary walked or sat, clasping in 
her hands, and sometimes reading one of the few books she 
chose to have about her. They were very simple works, 
for the most part old, and telling in quaint language of 
brave deeds done in silence; of sorrows borne with forti- 
tude ; and of the lives of those who had been good men and 
women through all the ages of all the world. They were 
mostly bound in white velvet, and clasped with old silver. 
But among them all she liked best the little Old Testament 
in crabbed Hebrew characters and a shabby leather binding, 
which had belonged to the mother she had never known. 
When she used it, the worn leaves always fell apart at the 
prophecies of Isaiah. A rare casket of carved white jade 
held the worn volume of the poor Jewish woman, when 
Mary had it not between her hands. 

But sometimes, when she was among the white flowers, 
touching their dainty faces with her slender fingers, and 
accepting to the full their sweet incense, the spirit of a 
vague unrest moved her, and urged her feet across the pad- 
dock, where in those days only white cows grazed, towards 
the little dairy, standing in the friendly shadow of an ever- 
green oak. 

About the perched doorway a white clematis had wreathed 
its lithe limbs, and hung out a great banner of silver stars. 
Round the deepest windows climbed a pale passion-flower, 
with only the shadow of the cross to mar the snow of its 
rounded petals. Within the small building all was neat 
and clean and radiantly white, untouched by colour, save 
when the reflection of the blue skies filtered through the 
oak branches. A tiled dado lined the walls breast-high, 
whence rose squares of half-transparent onyx as far as the 
open ceiling, which was of white wood beams, and sup- 
ported a lantern roof of clear glass. Small tiles of a pale 


180 


WITHOUT SIN 


cream hue, and set in a herring-bone pattern, formed the 
stainless floor, across which, in a trough of white marble, 
ran a stream of water, that fell with a sound of tinkling 
bells from a group of young loves and swans of fine Parian 
china. 

Around the walls, on low tables of white wood, stood 
the pans, white as the rich milk that filled them. The 
cream, tinged a slight yellow, stood apart in graceful bowls 
with double handles. The churn and skimmers, with the 
pails, glistened like burnished silver from an alcove, the 
wooden butter moulds and pats, scoured white as wool, 
made a pleasant display on an adjacent shelf. 

Behind the glass doors of a quaint cupboard, inlaid with 
leaves and flowers of mother-o’ -pearl, stood some cups and 
dishes of rare old Leeds ware, glazed a deep cream colour. 
She loved to dip a cup in a brimming pan, and watch with 
childish pleasure the milky drops slide down the smooth 
sides of the drinking-vessel, as she raised it to her lips. 

A white goat she had bought and taught to follow her 
about, accompanied her to the dairy, and sniffed with its 
innocent nose at pans and pails alike. 

As the days drew in, and the soft summer mists, like 
tufted wool, floated across the open spaces of her world, 
she left the gardens, where the flowers lay in argent glory 
under the white radiance of a broad moon, and spent the 
evening hours in the snowy nest she had made for herself. 
The electric lights and tall candles shone starlike among 
the clouds of muslin and of lace, and cast light rays on her 
own pale beauty. 

At night, before she prayed, she bathed again, lest any 
stain of earth should mar the fairness of that body with 
which she thanked her God. 

Even as “ an angel-watered lily that near God grows and 
is quiet,” holding herself in absolute hope and trust and 


WITHOUT SIN 


181 


perfect faith for the future, Mary spent her days from the 
beginning even unto the end, and the white moon which 
shone in at her window, and the sparkle of the silver foun- 
tain which babbled in the still blueness of the night, were 
not more innocent of a fleck upon their purity than was the 
little white girl who lay in the big white bed, and dreamed 
of the child who was to know no man for a father. 


CHAPTER XX 


For a week Mary did not leave her house. But, the 
first waves of womanly fear and religious emotion past, the 
mantle of ineffable confidence and happy peace enwrapped 
her. 

Her secret was as yet unknown, save, perhaps, in the 
seething workshops and tawdry parlours of the great East 
End Ghetto, where there hummed awestruck mutterings of 
a mighty miracle, and veiled hints of a prophecy to be ful- 
filled — even in the lifetime of those who spoke. 

But even such mysterious whispers died into st)eedy 
oblivion. The vague pronouncements of Mrs. Marx, mum- 
bled incoherently between large mouthfuls of sweet pickles, 
were scarcely worthy of even the passing notice of her 
sweated and starved compatriots. 

For Mrs. Marx knew, or at least retained in her mind, 
what nebulous assumptions she had gleaned during a short 
visit her niece had paid her in her own apartments. The 
conversation on the occasion fell entirely to Mary, -who, in 
very few and simple words, told her aunt that she was the 
chosen instrument for a marvellous manifestation. 

Mrs. Marx, who was eating huge pieces of ‘‘Turkish 
delight” from a paper bag, cramming the rose-scented, 
sticky dainty into her mouth with fat-beringed fingers, and 
covering her coarse lips and double chin with powdered 
sugar, heard Mary’s news without one quiver of emotion. 

No womanly anxiety for the girl’s physical well-being. 


WITHOUT SIN 


183 


no sympathy with the awful ordeal which lay before her, 
not even vulgar curiosity or unreasoning anger pulsed in 
the old Jewess’s selfish heart, or spoke from her honey- 
filled chewing mouth. 

Mary, who had struggled long before she could bring 
herself to fulfil the Judaic law of honour and duty to those 
of her own family, and who had instinctively fought against 
betraying her sacred secret to the last woman in the world 
whom she could ever hold in love and reverence, was stung 
to the quick by Mrs. Marx’s callous indifference. Was it 
thus that the race which was to be redeemed through her 
child would receive the manifestation of God’s clemency 
and forgiveness? Would the prospect of being once more 
a nation among nations, honoured, reputed, and feared, be 
thus thrust aside without one prayer of gratitude or one 
song of praise? 

For the moment, Mrs. Marx, with her brutish ignorance, 
her coarse instincts, her sensual indulgences, her narrow, 
self-centred ambitions, seemed to Mary the type of her 
people, and at the thought the girl’s meek spirit rebelled 
and a great cry rose up in her heart that there might be no 
future. 

“They are not worthy!” her wounded spirit wailed. 

But when she was back in her own boudoir, where the 
sweet summer airs fiuttered all day long under the striped 
awnings and sighed amid the big bowls of fresh roses, and 
where the sunlight, filtering through chestnuts and elms, 
cast a tender veil of golden green on the quaint commodes 
and cabinets, the shining silver, and rare china, and lent a 
new mysterious charm to the dove-eyed Madonna, who, 
with joined fingers and sweet childish mouth, smiled above 
a big vase filled with white lilies, resignation came to her. 

Here, amid the surroundings she loved, and before the 
picture she reverenced, courage and hope strengthened and 


184 


WITHOUT SiN 


grew ill her sad heart, and her faith in her God, in hei 
future, and in herself, flowed back into its old channels. 

During that week of introspection and self-communion, 
Lady St. Cyprien came to see Mary each day. 

Of Stansdale’s genuine grief and manly sorrow at his 
broken engagement. Lady St. Cyprien said little. Her love 
and her discretion warned her that to harp on the inevitable 
would be both ineffectual and cruel. She was a woman 
who had never indulged in idle tears. 

“ His regret is profound, for he loves you very dearly. 
But his faith in you, like mine, is unalterable, and will 
endure till the end,’’ Lady St. Cyprien had said, and then 
the engagement was as though it had never been. 

At the end of the week, when Lady St. Cyprien arrived 
as usual at Holmhurst, she was told that, the day being 
fine. Miss Levinge and Mrs. Marx had started for a long 
drive into the country, and were not expected back till late. 

That same evening Mr. Erastus Bawdon had a “little 
music” at his flat in Victoria Street. His entertainments 
were sufficiently out of the way to attract even the most 
blase of his circle. 

“ You see, one never knows what Erastus is going to let 
one in for. He gives regular ‘surprise’ parties,” had 
shrilled Lady Theo across the railings in the Park that 
afternoon. “ One night he had cards and grilled bones till 
breakfast time. Another it was a reformed drunkard, who 
gave us a lecture on D. T. ; lemonade was served and lights 
were out at eleven. He made up for it by a very tidy prize 
fight the following week. I never miss a party at Baw- 
don’s.” 

So about midnight the thirty guests whom Mr. Bawdon 
had favoured with invitations were assembled in his draw- 
ing-room, which was gorgeously decorated in sufficiently 
divergent styles as to remind a new-comer of a pagan 


WITHOUT SIN 


185 


temple in the East and a side chapel in a Catholic church. 
The decors of his flat varied with his religions, and at 
present the suggestion of a chapel was in the ascendant. 

The “ little music” — which had been supplied by a dubi- 
ously clean band of howling drum-beating Orientals, and a 
fat Circassian woman, who had danced the dance’ of sug- 
gestion rather than intention — was over. The performers 
were removed by Mr. Baw don’s Hindoo servant, and the 
guests, who had been seated, rose and wandered rather 
aimlessly about. The night was intensely hot and languid, 
and the dreary monotony of the Eastern music and the lazy 
movements of the fat dancer had depressed everybody. 

In the first movement at least a dozen guests slipped 
away, the men to their clubs, the women to the compara- 
tive coolness of their lawn nightdresses and darkened bed- 
rooms. Those who remained obviously wondered why they 
did so. 

But Mr. Bawdon was a man of resource. It was his last 
party of the season, and he did not intend it to be an entire 
failure. 

A score of us left, and all good for a flutter, ” he said 
in his massive tones. “Just enough for a little game.” 

He pulled back an arras, made from a wonderfully 
wrought carpet which he had acquired in India during his 
profession of Buddhism. A charming card-room, perfectly 
arranged and outrageously Philistine in decoration and 
colour, lay beyond. It was a relic of his Agnostic days, 
which even in his most fervent throes of emotional religion 
he had lacked the strength of mind to obliterate, though 
he had been known to effect a compromise by shutting 
it up. 

His guests moved toward the card-room. It looked cool 
and pleasantly commonplace after the heavily scented, over- 
elaborate, tiresome complexity of the drawing-room, and on 


186 


WITHOUT SIN 


a buffet, laid amid clear crystals of ice, were gold-tipped 
bottles flanked by glittering cut glasses and many dishes 
of tempting sandwiches. 

Lady Theo was first across the room, her face, which 
had looked very worn and haggard all the evening, per- 
ceptibly brightening at the prospect of a gamble. Suddenly 
she stopped, and, facing round, cried to those who were 
following her, ^‘No! No! We mustn’t go in there. We 
mustn’t play cards — above all, for money.” 

“What’s the joke, dear lady? Pray explain,” drawled 
Bertie Chant, who, very flaccid and weary after the hard 
work of the season, strolled past her and dropped into a 
chair by the card-table. 

“Bertie, come away!“ cried Lady Theo, working herself 
up, as women will, for a scene. “Mr. Bawdon, I beg of 
you to shut your card-room. At such a moment — to 
gamble and bet — when the time is already too short — only 
a few more months of preparation ” 

“Bravo! Bravo!” applauded Bertie Chant, patting his 
hands softly together as he returned to the drawing-room, 
and whispered in Dr. Noel Marrable’s ear that this was 
another of Bawdon’ s surprises. 

“Preparation! what in heaven’s name have we got to 
prepare for?” asked Dr. Marrable, thinking to give Lady 
Theo a friendly hand in a got-up scene. 

“For the regeneration, or for the annihilation of the 
world. It may be a few weeks only before we are called to 
our last account.” 

“What a quite too awful idea. Lady Theo,” tittered a 
pretty woman with an outrageously decollete gown and 
obviously dyed hair. 

“ Oh ! shocking ! But who on earth is going to do such a 
very uncomfortable thing ?” babbled Bertie Chant in his 
most insipid tones. 


WITHOUT SIN 


1B7 


“He who is to come!” cried Lady Theo, her face very 
white and her ’eyes very brilliant. “ The second Manifes- 
tation of the divine mercy is at hand ” 

“For God’s sake stop her, Aunt Adela,” whispered Lord 
Stansdale, slipping round the little crowd to Lady St. 
Cyprien’s side. “She’ll throw Mary’s name to these gap- 
ing fools in another moment, and then ” 

“A Redeemer is coming among us for a second time. 
How shall we who have wasted our lives in selfish pleasures 
and the gratification of the flesh, live in his sacred pres- 
ence?” went on Lady Theo in her loud, clear voice. 

Mr. Erastus Bawdon’s large face grew ominously grave. 
Lady Theo was curiously vulgar, piquantly plain, she was 
a privileged person in high circles, and he himself had had, 
in other and more material days, a considerable weakness 
for her. But his cultured sense had always revolted at 
anything that savoured of blasphemy, as being devoid of 
proportion and lacking in beauty, and at the present 
moment he felt fearful as to how far Lady Theo’s rather 
deficient sense of art might carry her. 

“Dear Lady Theo,” he began sonorously. “A joke is 

always charming, but surely on such a subject ” 

“ Oh ! don’t stop her, ” cried she of the bust and shoulders. 
“ She’s quite too funny.” 

“So fresh!” sighed Bertie. “Quite original! Lady 
Theo as a preacher would draw all London. Where’s it to 
be? Have you engaged the Abbey or St. Paul’s?” 

“ I cannot preach to you,” cried Lady Theo, with desper- 
ation. “ I am not worthy. I am only fitted to warn you. 
He who will tell you the truth, who will show you the way 
to salvation, is to come, and is at hand.” 

“Theo! Theo, dear, don’t you see they’re laughing at 
you?” whispered Lady St. Cyprien, who, with a frightened 
look on her stately face, had come close to the other’s side. 


188 


WITHOUT SIN 


“ They think you are in fun. Let us go away. I will take 
you home.’’ 

“Oh! dear Lady St. Cyprien, don’t interrupt. I believe 
Lady Theo has joined the Salvation Army,” giggled Bertie 
Chant flippantly. 

“A.h! you may all laugh now,” cried Lady Theo with 
emotional defiance. “ But wait till you hear that the 
prophecy — surely you read your Bibles once — is fulfilled. 
AVait till the news goes that a holy child is born of a holy 
virgin.” 

A burst of noisy laughter rang through the room. Dr. 
Marrable, who had been leaning against the carved mantel, 
suddenly stiffened himself and listened intently to the ebb 
and flow of words. 

Only Lady St. Cyprien and Lord Stansdale were silent, 
while Erastus Bawdon scowled heavily. 

“Oh! you may laugh, you may sneer,” said Lady Theo, 
tossing her head. “ You think the age of miracles is past. 
But I know that there is yet one to come. I know that 
there is one who is a saint, an angel on earth; one who 
alone is fitted to be the instrument of this wicked world’s 
salvation.” 

“Name! Name! Name!” shouted half a dozen laughing 
voices. 

Stansdale caught his breath hard and waited for the blow 
he was powerless to avert. 

Lady St. Cyprien’ s right hand flashed whitely towards 
Lady Theo’s parted lips, but she was too late. 

“Mary Levinge!” 

The two words dropped, but were caught and echoed in 
twenty different tones. 

Stansdale turned deadly white, and Marrable, standing 
apart in the shadows, staggered as though he had been 
struck. 


WITHOUT SIN 


189 


Was the vague suspicion that he had silenced a hundred 
times lately in his own mind a fact? Was the shadow 
going to take substance and crush his own heart and her 
fair name in one hideous ruin? At Lady Theo’s words 
memory opened as a book, and he recalled how during the 
past few months every look, every act, every symptom had 
pointed accusing lingers of doubt and suspicion at the one 
woman in the world for whom he had ever had profound 
faith and reverence, and for whom he had ever felt the 
pulses of love. The experience of the doctor was wide, but 
the affection and belief that filled the man’s heart fought 
hard with his brain. His common-sense said, “It is!” 
His soul cried, “It cannot be!” Every one, he told him- 
self, had made mistakes. Good women had been slandered 
before now, and only death had proved their innocence. 

And now the name of the girl in whose sinlessness he 
believed, on whose innocence he would have staked his 
soul’s salvation, was to be made a bye-word, and he — he 
dared not defend her. 

“Mary Levinge! Impossible!” exclaimed Bawdon, 
loudly. “ Why, she is coming here to-night. I had a 
note from her only this morning, saying that she was going 
to pass the day in the country, and should be late.” 

“Oh! she’ll never dare come!” cried the decollete dame, 
with outraged virtue glowing from every inch of her bare 
skin. 

. “What shall we do if she does?” 

“ I shall see how things go.” 

“I think I shall leave at once,” murmured the other 
fluttering femininities. The hubbub was at its height. 
Society, with a new victim flung on its mercy, cast away 
its veneer, and whetted its fangs and sharpened its claws, 
preparatory to the rending and devouring of the fair repu- 
tation of a young and beautiful woman. 


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With shrill voices aud cruel eyes they fought and 
wrangled over the possibilities and probabilities. The 
women’s shoulders shrugged right out of their gowns, the 
men’s eyes grew warm and their lips moist and loose, as 
they hazarded a hundred guesses, or affirmed a score of 
facts. 

Only Lady St. Cyprien stood sternly apart, her handsome 
face set in the effort to keep back her tears, and Stansdale, 
sunk in a chair, covered his face with his hands. 

“Miss Levinge.” 

The soft voice of the Indian servant was heard above the 
babel, and carried a dead silence through the room. 

Mary entered, her tall, slender form gowned in soft 
white silk, which fell in ungirdled folds straight to her 
feet from a wide throatlet of worked silver and great tur- 
quoises. Her gold hair was drawn simply from her fore- 
head, on which played a light mesh of soft, loose curls. 
She was not paler than usual, but her expression was inten- 
sified in its sweetness, and her eyes set in her slightly 
sharpened face, seemed larger and of greater depth. For 
an appreciable space of time no one spoke, and she stood in 
the amber shaded light, a fair picture of sainthood outlined 
against the dim tapestries, which told in uncouth colourings 
and faded outlines some mythical adventure of the old 
Greek gods. 

It was Lady St. Cyprien who broke the spell which mock 
morality and false virtue were casting over Mr. Bawdon’s 
guests. 

She swept past the suspicious women and doubting men, 
and with outstretched hands of welcome, cried : 

“My dear, how late you are; but we are all so pleased 
to see you.” 

Then she kissed her on the brow, and, flinging one arm 
round the girl, she led her through them all to a low seat. 


WITHOUT SIN 


191 


With shy handshakes and awkward salutations they 
greeted Mary, but Lady Theo, with a quaint admixture of 
religious fervour and the deference she would pay to a royal 
X^ersonage, swept a low curtsey as she passed by. 

Then Mr. Erastus Bawdon, conscious that the Eubicon 
was crossed, gave her a warm yet reverential greeting. 
Lord Stansdale, the one man she had dreaded meeting, 
spoke to her almost at once, and the strain of publicly 
addressing her once over, took a seat by her side. 

Marrable was the very last to go near her. He was pale 
as ashes, and looked drawn and old in the bright light. He 
merely extended a cool, formal hand, after taking leave of 
Lady St. Cyprien. 

“I doubt our meeting again before the autumn,” he said 
to Lady St. Cyprien. “I start for Norway to-morrow.” 

“And we shall be settled in Scotland before you are 
back. Won’t you spare a week to the grouse? I can offer 
plenty of them — and, perhaps. Miss Levinge as attractions. 
Otherwise, we shall be very quiet there this year.” 

He fixed his keen dark eyes on Mary’s face for a moment, 
and paused before replying. 

Was he waiting for a sign from her? If so, he was 
ungratified, for no shadow of interest in him or conscious- 
ness of his gaze touched her unclouded eyes or sweet, 
curved lips. 

“ I am fixed to Norway for as long as I can be away ; 
but thanks very much, all the same. Good-night — and 
good-bye.” 

The curtains were dropped over the card-room, and till 
the rosy summer dawn x)uled the electric lights beneath 
their shades of amber silk to a sickly yellow, Mary sat amid 
the few who stayed. 

Again her gentle voice told of her vision, and of the later 
revelation which had come to her. Her words were very 


192 


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few, but the simplicity of truth spoke with her mouth, the 
light of fervent faith shone in her dreamy eyes. 

Erastus Bawdon was delighted. A new cult had been 
started in his drawing-rooms; the first scenes of a fresh 
dp.velopment of the world’s history were acted there. 


CHAPTER XXI 


Business was over for the day. The ponderous iron 
shutters had slowly veiled from late passers-by the delicate 
china and geinlike pictures set forth behind the plate glass 
windows of Levinge’s Art Gallery. The purple twilight 
lay thick and heavy in the front shop, where a couple of 
assistants, with liquid dark eyes and markedly Jewish 
faces, were quietly checking the rare contents of a large 
case which had come up from Christie’s salesrooms an hour 
ago. 

In the Gallery itself it was lighter, and Martin Baird 
could still see to mark a bulky catalogue. Presently the 
young clerks — sent to Levinge’s to learn the business — 
announced their task as fulfilled, and took their leave. 
The boy in a green baize apron, who only appears in West 
End emporiums in the early morning or at closing time, let 
them out at the narrow wicket cut in the shutter and then 
came to his master. 

“ Papers, sir. Anything more, sir?” 

“Only these letters for the post — and drop that into the 
box at Joshua’s as you go down the street. Good-night.” 

“Good-night, sir.” 

The rattle of a closing door announced the boy’s de- 
parture. 

Baird wrote on in the fast fading light, working at his 
catalogues, noting instructions from customers, and jotting 
down prices till the last gleams faded, and he dropped the 
papers on his knees. 

13 


194 


WITHOUT SIN 


The pictures had lost all colour with the dying day, but 
the statuary loomed vaguely white; and a suit of armour, 
worked in delicate chased tracery that was fine as cobweb 
lace, shone with pale, reflected beams from a distant 
corner. 

Baird sat very still, his bowed figure and lean grey head 
absorbed in the shadowy depths of the great chair of quaint 
Italian carving he occupied. He loved the Gallery, as a 
man with a lonely heart is forced to love the inanimate 
background whence his friends had faded. He would often 
spend long hours there, oblivious of the fair objects which 
hemmed him close on every side, remembering only that 
amidst the ever-changing surroundings he had been very 
happy. His squalid boyhood, his disappointed youth, 
faded to forgetfulness, and he only remembered the years 
he had spent in the Bond Street shop. 

In fancy he saw old Ephraim Levinge, shabby and bent, 
with his big clever head surmounted by a skull-cap, passing 
to and fro among the relics of a score of countries, mutter- 
ing his long prayers in the soft oily tongue of a dead nation. 
Again he saw the large coarse fingers handling with ten- 
derest touch and practised surety the egg-shell wonders of 
a tiny cup or the fragile weft of some priceless tapestry. 
He remembered the look of cunning over a bargain, the 
calm determination in face of a heavy and risky outlay. 
He recalled the instinctive sympathy with the fad of the 
moment, and the almost proi^hetic foresight as to future 
fashionable fancies, which are such attributes of the Jewish 
people, and which enable them, and them alone, to build 
large fortunes from the dispersal of other men’s homes. 

Then the waking dream changed. Round the door 
peeped a child’s flaxen head, and among the giant vases 
and tall carved cabinets a little white-robed figure walked 
sedately. 


WITHOUT SIN 


195 


“Martin, tell me a story.” 

And a thousand legends of fancy and of fact thronged 
back on Baird. How she had questioned and wondered — 
and believed! 

Instinctively he raised his eyes, and peered through the 
blue dusk to where the painted panel of the angel-faced 
Madonna had hung for so many years. One of Charles II. ’s 
buxom beauties in all the conventional disarray of Lely’s 
composition, with bold round eyes and bare round breasts, 
hung there now. A quaint fancy that the picture, with its 
tawdry affectation of simplicity, desecrated the past, fell 
upon him and he determined to have it moved elsewhere on 
the morrow. 

“Sir! Are you there?” asked a woman’s voice. 

“ Yes, Mrs. Wills. I am tired, and am resting in the 
dark.” 

“Your supper is ready, sir.” 

“Very well. Serve it. I shall be upstairs in five 
minutes. ” 

The housekeeper’s footsteps died away, and Baird, with- 
out rising, switched on the electric light, preparatory to 
putitng away his papers and seeing all was safe for the 
night. He blinked a moment in the strong glare, then his 
eyes, as they cleared, caught sight of the evening papers the 
boy had placed at his side before leaving. Idly he opened 
The PkvadUhj Gazette, glancing at the clearly printed 
columns as he slowly paced across the Gallery. 

Suddenly he stopped. The ascetic lines of his rugged 
face stiffened. He read and re-read a short paragraph, 
then let the journal flutter to his feet. 

“Miss Mary! Oh, God!” he cried aloud. “It can’t 
be true. The man who wrote such words is a liar and a 
coward, so to traduce a saint like that.” 

All the chivalry latent in his cold Scottish nature was 


196 


WITHOUT SIN 


aroused, and a fierce unrest seized upon him to go out and 
thrash the unknown writer of lies. 

But first of all, he must know the truth. He despised 
himself for the doubt that such a desire implied, but he 
could not bring her fair name into a brawl without seeing 
her. One glance at her pure face, one word of her sweet 
voice, would nerve him to his task of avenger. 

It was ten o’clock before he rang the bell at Holmhurst, 
but the servants knew his position with regard to their mis- 
tress, and he was admitted and at once taken to her boudoir. 

“Martin! how kind of you to come,” was her greeting. 
“But— surely you’ve brought no bad news — there is noth- 
ing wrong, I hope.” 

“Nothing is wrong. Miss Levinge — except — this shame- 
ful thing ” 

He had not touched her proffered hand, for he had 
doubted, and was not worthy. But he held out towards 
her the newspaper, and pointed to the paragraph. 

She took it from him, glanced over the lines, and then 
laid the paper quietly down. 

“ It is quite true,” she said simply. 

Martin reeled as though he had been struck. 

“True! True! That you are” — his lips refused to 
frame the accusing words. 

“ It is true that I am elect among all women, and that, 
in the fulness of time, the one for whom my people have 
looked and prayed through the centuries is to come.” 

Martin Baird looked at her, as she stood there, tall and 
fair, and pure as one of her own name flowers. Was she 
mad, or was it all true? 

He knew vaguely the faith of the Jews— that a prophecy 
was yet to be verified — that a redeemer had yet to come. 
But that she, so tender, so young, should be set apart, 
3eemed to him too fearful— too wonderful, 


WITHOUT SIN 


197 


Yet as he looked at her, the consciousness of a marvel- 
lous change in her came to him. An expression of saintly 
beatitude irrradiated from her face, she seemed hedged 
about with a more than earthly dignity, the glory of an 
overwhelming purity shone above her head. 

And yet — and yet — there was that hateful print — and 
surely the age of miracles was past. Filled with fears for 
her well-being, racked with doubts for her happiness, the 
faithful servant stood before the girl, who was at once his 
mistress and his greatest charge. 

“Miss Mary! Miss Mary!” he cried, holding out hands 
which grief had enfeebled and made trembling. “Can 
nothing be done?” 

“There is nothing to do but to wait the Lord’s good 
time.” 

“But people — the world — your world. Ah! my dear, 
my dear, how they will scoff at you. ” 

She drew herself up and answered fervently : 

“ Let them. God knows that 1 am pure.” 

Martin Baird’s hands dropped abashed, as though she 
had reproved him with a lack of faith. He stood before 
her, his face puckered in acute thought, his stern, thin 
mouth working with emotion. 

AVhen he spoke again his voice was thick and husky, and 
he did not look at her. 

“ Miss Mary, often before your grandfather died, he 
made me promise that I would give my life in your service. 
It was the one price he asked in payment for all that he 
had done for me. I swore — not once, but many times, 
that so long as I had breath I would stand between you and 
sorrow. Miss Mary, I’ve known you as a little child — 
I’ve watched you as a girl — I’ve prayed that I might see 
you a happy wife. All these years you’ve had no need of 
me, but now — now I may be of some use to you.” 


198 


WITHOUT SIN 


Ho drew nearer to her, his whole body trembling with 
excess of pity — and of fear. 

“Miss Mary — let me marry you.” 

“Martin! you are mad!” cried the girl starting back. 

“No, I am not; only hear me out. Let me marry you, 
I beseech. No one need ever know, for I at least will keep 
silence. Only in case they make it too hard for you at any 
time — in case they are too cruel— then I will speak.” 

The girl’s eyes filled with tears. The man’s intense 
devotion — his love for her — holy and selfless as that of St. 
Joseph— touched her to deepest gratitude. 

She laid both hands, so long and white and fast growing 
thin to transparency, upon his two shoulders. 

“ Faitfhul servant, dear friend. You move me to my 
very soul. But — I am in higher hands. My destiny is 
written. The world cannot harm me; the world cannot 
help me.” 

She spoke but little more, for one of her moods of silent 
ecstasy fell upon her. But Martin Baird understood. For, 
as broken-hearted he left her white presence, he knew that 
no man should ever call her wife. 


CHAPTER XXII. 


Mrs. Mossenthal always spent the hour between break- 
fast and her morning walk in her dining-room. The trees 
in the Square garden were already shedding their sunburnt, 
smoke-dried leaves, which lay in untidy heaps in the gut- 
ters and roadway. 

Mrs. Mossenthal, whose colourless eyes and long nose 
peered above the flower-boxes on the window sill, frowned 
as a puff of summer air whirled a barrow full of dust and 
leaves across the freshly cleaned front doorsteps of her house 
and down the area. 

It was a very hot morning, but Mrs. Mossenthal was 
characteristically gowned in a dark grey, tightly fitting 
tweed, with an abnormally high collar. Her ash-coloured 
hair looked more than ever as if it were painted against 
her sallow face, and with her nipped, flat waist and stiff 
shoulders, she had all the appearance of a Dutch doll. The 
dining-room, handsomely as it was furnished, was as un- 
compromisingl}’’ precise and wooden as herself. 

No cheery litter of morning papers or correspondence 
met the eye. Mrs. MossenthaPs letters were destroyed as 
soon as answered, and the place for the Ladies’ Pictorial 
was the low^est shelf of the dinner waggon, where it did not 
look “untidy.’’ 

Having scowled sufficiently at the flying leaves, she rang 
the dining-room bell sharply three times. A moment later 
her maid, who always waited outside the door in anticipa- 
tion of the summons, entered. 


200 


WITHOUT SIN 


“Put on my boots, Bates, at once, and tell me what I’ve 
got to do to-day.” 

Mrs. Mossenthal knew perfectly well what her day’s 
engagements were, but she enjoyed the sensation of domi- 
nating the mind of another, even a servant, with her own 
petty desires and requirements. It gave her a sense of 
power, which, being of a tyrannical nature, she loved to 
exercise. 

“Well, ma’am,” began Bates, in a sing-song voice, as 
she laced a pair of well-made boots on her mistress’s large 
feet. “ You’ve got to give the orders and go to the mani- 
cures now, and at half-past twelve Madame Sophie expects 
you to try on your dresses. Mrs. Bellamy comes to 
lunch ” 

“ And mind I wear that pink crepon. Now, don’t for- 
get. Mrs. Bellamy’s not seen that yet,” snapped Mrs. 
Mossenthal, with that petulant vigour she put into every- 
thing which concerned herself. 

“Very well, ma’am. Then you’ve ordered the carriage 
at three, and there are nineteen sets of cards to be left in 
South Kensington. At five Mrs. Norton will be here to 
massage you, and at six Jules is coming to shampoo your 
hair and dress it.” 

“And mind you have plenty of hot towels this time. 
You know I have to be ready to go out at eight, and Mr. 
Mossenthal hates to be kept waiting. Now go and put my 
things out : the grey hat and gloves, and the veil I wore 
yesterday. ” 

Mrs. Mossenthal ’s thin mouth widened in a smile as she 
once again went through to herself her engagements for the 
coming day. She thank God that no one could accuse her 
of indolence. She did not waste her time romping with a 
nursery full of children, or lazing over the papers ; she did 
not interfere in drawing-room meetings or worry her friends 


WITHOUT SIN 


201 


to subscribe to charities they cared nothing about ; no one 
could quote an instance of her intruding on bitter grief or 
bothering in sick-rooms. No! she spent her time, her 
thoughts, and her money on herself. 

“And,” she said aloud, as she rose from her chair, “if 
every one else did the same, it would be a very good thing 
for the world in general.” 

A sharp ring at the door bell arrested her thoughts, and 
she hurried with her ungainly walk across the room. 

“James!” she hissed in a loud whisper through the din- 
ing-room door, to the advancing footman. “James! I 
can’t see anybody.” I’m just going out, and I’ve got all 
the orders to give and my nails to be polished between 
now and twelve. I’ve no time to waste on callers.” 

The visitor seemed to be in as great a hurry ,as Mrs. 
Mossenthal, for before the footman, who was struggling 
into his jacket while his mistress addressed him, could 
reach the door, the bell rang again loudly. 

“Be quick, James! and say ‘Not at home.’ ” 

Curious to ascertain who would so far trespass the rigid 
rules of Bayswater etiquette as to pay a call at ten in the 
morning, Mrs. Mossenthal laid her ear against the crack of 
the dining-room door, which she held ajar. 

“Not at home! Are you quite sure?” said a voice with 
the well-known tribal twang running through it. “ Mrs. 
Mossenthal does not go out before ten as a rule, does she?” 

Becognising Mrs. Cohen’s voice, and fearing that under 
a strict cross-examination James would break down, Mrs. 
Mossenthal deemed it best to advance with what cordiality 
she could into the hall, and invite her visitor in. 

“Oh! I thought that boy of yours was not telling the 
truth,” cried Mrs. Cohen, squeezing her vast bulk past 
the footman. “ I was certain you would be in to me.’ 

But Mrs. Mossenthal’s greeting was scarcely cordial. 


202 


WITHOUT SIN 


Her sour face did uot even relax into a Society smile, and 
she did not offer Mrs. Cohen a seat, but with a cold hand- 
shake stood upright just within the door. 

Mrs. Cohen was not to be deterred, however, by such 
trifles. She pushed into the dining-room, and sitting 
heavily in a chair, began to fan herself with a large green 
paper fan which was slung round her on a black ribbon. 

“My dear!” she began, gasping heavily under her moun- 
tainous bust, which, unrestrained by the blouse of soiled 
light silk which she wore, assumed astonishing proportions. 
“ What a fearful thing this is. My poor Eugene — what an 
escape.” 

Mrs. Mossenthal tightened her mouth till it looked like 
a straight gash in her yellow face, but otherwise evinced 
no emotion. The fact that Eugene Cohen had never shown 
the slightest interest in herself was quite sufficient to make 
her dislike the young man. 

“ Surely you have heard? Isn’t your husband shocked?” 
went on Mrs. Cohen, now a little nettled at the coolness with 
which she and her prospective bombshell were being re- 
ceived, and rattling her green fan till it creaked. 

“I’ve heard nothing, and ’Sac always takes the imper 
away with him,” answered Mrs. Mossenthal, with an indif- 
ference which veiled admirably a growing curiosity as to 
why the Queen of Bayswater should have come round so 
early in the morning. 

“ If you wait to read it in the papers you’ll never know 
about it, ’’said Mrs. Cohen contemptuously. “Though I 
hear there was a hinting sort of paragraph without names 
ill The Piccadilly Gazette a night or two ago. But the scan- 
dal is all over the town. It’s — about — Mary — LevingeP^ 

Mrs. Cohen said the words slowly, and with an intention 
not devoid of malice, for she knew that the Mossenthals 
boasted among their own set of their kinship with the great 


WITHOUT SIN 


203 


heiress, and she had never forgiven Mary for refusing to 
marry her son. Her dark eyes, alight with triumph, 
watched Mrs. Mossenthal grow green, which was her blood- 
less equivalent for flushing. She noted how she glanced 
into the hall and passage before closing the dining-room 
door, and coming slowly over to the table. 

“About Mary Levinge! What’s she been doing?” 

Mrs. Cohen laid one fat hand in a stained glove on Mrs. 
Mossenthal’ s arm, and drawing her down, whispered some- 
thing in her ear. 

“ How horrible ! Ah ! the wretched girl, ” cried Mrs. 
Mossenthal, all the savage fury of a woman who is en- 
forcedly chaste by reason of her want of attraction, embit- 
tering her thin high voice. “ That’s what comes of being 
loj fine to live decently among her own people. We were 
not good enough for her.” 

Mrs. Cohen nodded her handsome head sympathetically. 

“I always said that after old Ephraim’s death Mary 
Levinge’ s place was with you, her only relations — until she 
married.” 

She had never said anything of the kind, but it suited 
her now to avenge herself on the girl with the first instru- 
ment that came to hand. 

Mrs. Mossenthal pulled a chair close to Mrs. Cohen and 
sat down. 

“Tell me really what you have heard— what people are 
saying.” 

And the two women, with interjections of sham disgust 
and affected horror, talked and turned and twisted the tale 
which was ringing through the drawing-rooms of London. 
They snorted scornfully at the strange belief whispered by 
Mary’s friends, and discussed with noisy indignation and 
smothered giggles every salacious suggestion and coarse 
innuendo. 


204 


WITHOUT SIN 


“ And you say the girl is still going about?” said Mrs. 
Mossenthal, sitting back in her chair at last. 

^‘Indeed, yes. I hear the scene at that Mr. Erastus 
Bawdon’s was disgraceful. One would think the girl had 
done something marvellous; they’re making a regular cult 
of her.” 

Mrs. Cohen creaked the green fan again and sniffed ag- 
gressively, but Mrs. Mossenthal was silent. Mechanically 
her glassy eyes wandered to the clock; it was past eleven, 
and she had missed her appointment wdth the manicure at 
Whiteley’s. For once that did not trouble her. With all 
her narrow ignorance and self-centred stupidity, Mrs. Mos- 
senthal had the racial eye for a “ good thing.” 

‘‘ They’re making a regular cult of her!” 

That meant that Lady St. Cyx^rien and her set, all of 
the great world, people who were above the jibes and jeers 
of the smaller fry, intended to stand by Mary. It might 
end in the lover — for, of course, there must be a lover, and 
one who was probably a very big ‘‘ swell” — coming forward 
and marrying her. Perhaps it would be as Avell to “ hedge” a 
little, though not of course to take open sides. ’Sac would 
nev’^er countenance that, for he had old-fashioned ideas 
about the virtue of the women of his people. But a little 
sympathetic kindness could do no harm, and if there was any 
social notoriety attaching to the business Mrs. Mossenthal 
saw no reason why she should not shine in the reflected light. 

‘^Perhaps the poor girl can’t help it,” she said presently, 
in a reflective manner. 

Can’t help what?” 

‘‘ Going about and not keeping people out of Holmhurst. 
I should think she would be very glad to get away to some 
quiet, retired spot.” 

Mrs. Cohen stopped the noisy waving of her fan. She 
waited for what was to come. 


WITHOUT SIN 


205 


“ I think I shall advise ’Sac to lend her our little place 
in Essex for the autunin, or till it’s all over, if she likes to 
stay on there. ‘The Nest’ is very quiet.” 

Mrs. Mossenthal did not look at Mrs. Cohen while she 
was speaking, and it was intuition more than ocular knowl- 
edge which warned her that the fierce light of suspicion 
was growing in that lady’s fine eyes. 

“We do not intend to go there this year ourselves. 
“ Sac is ordered to Carlsbad, and then we shall spend the 
autumn in Italy.” 

The words were in due season, and Mrs. Cohen’s rising 
wrath was somewhat appeased, though she could not resist 
saying ; 

“ You must do as you please about that, of course. Mary 
is your relative, and I thank heaven heartily that I’ve 
nothing to do with her.” 

Then Mrs. Cohen felt better and began to devise a means 
by which slie could herself see the girl. 

“ All the same, I thank that immediate steps should be 
taken to expostulate with Mary as to her conduct in still 
going about. It brings vs into contempt with the Chris- 
tian set.” 

Mrs. Mossenthal rode for a fall. 

“ It will be my duty to see her at once,” she said. 

“But she won’t see you,” cried Mrs. Cohen bluntly. 
“ I’m told no one is admitted to Holmhurst without express 
orders — and, besides, my dear — you scarcely know her, do 
you?” 

Mrs. Mossenthal’ s face hardened. 

“ She’s dined here.” 

“Once!” interposed the other calmly. “And I don’t 
remember that you ever dined with her at her house.” 

Mrs. Mossenthal waived the degree of intimacy, and 
asked who was to speak to Mary with regard to her conduct. 


206 


WITHOUT SIN 


It was on the tip of Mrs. Cohen’s tongue to claim the 
privilege, but a glance at her hostess’s sullen face warned 
her to be careful. 

“I’ll tell you what we’ll do, we’ll all speak to her.” 
She snapped her fan twice in triumph. “I will write to 
Mary this very day, a kind letter of course, and just ask 
her to come to tea one afternoon. You can drop in — 
and shall w'e say next Thursday?” 

“ And where shall this meeting be held?” asked Mrs. 
Mossenthal. 

Mrs. Cohen rose, smoothed down the tumbled front pleats 
of her blouse, walked to the door and opened it before she 
answered. 

“At my house, of course, four o’clock.” 

As Mrs. Mossenthal followed her through the hall she 
felt that she could yield that last point, for of course Mary 
would accept the offer of “The Nest,” and perhaps that 
stuck-up Lady St. Cyprien would go there with her. 

“Very well,” she said, with a fair grace, as she drew 
back the latch of the front door. “ Four on Thursday.” 

A railway van pulled up at the house, and a large ham- 
per was handed down. 

“Oh! there’s the weekly hamper from ‘The Nest.’ I 
have no more time to chat, Mrs. Cohen ; I must go down- 
stairs and see the vegetables weighed. Servants are so 
dishonest.” 


CHAPTER XXIII 


From a social standpoint Mrs. Isaac Mossenthal detested 
her own people. It was not to rub shoulders with her kind 
that she haunted Kempton and struggled for invitations to 
Hurlingham. Her flaunting Worth gowns and exaggerated 
Virot bonnets, expressly built for the English market and 
hopelessly un-Parisian, which she picked up as “ marked 
down” models at sales in second-rate Regent Street show- 
rooms, seldom graced the tawdry drawing-rooms of Maida 
Vale and Kensington. 

Rather did she prefer to play Maecenas in petticoats in 
dingy studios at the back of Campden Hill, or in the more 
doubtful side-streets of Fulham. There, among unshorn 
daubers and unshaved mummers, half-a-dozen lady scrib- 
blers on “ fashions” in smart bonnets and doubtful boots — a 
few young women who, on the plea of a desire for inde- 
pendence or irrepressible artistic yearnings, had left their 
parents^ roofs and were living, no one knew how or where ; 
amidst this idle crowd of, conceited fribbles, who talked 
bad art and professed the cult of “ Self”— Mrs. Mossenthal 
felt that she was in the “movement.” 

“I hate Jewesses; they can never talk of anything but 
babies and servants,” she would say in high nasal tones. 
“Celebrities are quite different, they’re so interesting.” 

And so she would garb herself in many-hued raiment 
and walk stifliy to her brougham and go off to listen to the 
latest scandal concerning Mrs. Larousse the pastellist and 
young Horton, who did those wonderful fog studies, and 


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how Maudie Taunton, the daughter of an old Indian officer, 
had dyed her hair orange and gone in for leg parts, and 
that Miss Templemore, the stuck-up girl with the white 
face, who sculpted, and who had boxed Tommie Biddulph’s 
ears when he tried to kiss her at Lottie Vere’s birthday 
supper, had gone into the country — Cumberland or Corn- 
wall — for six months, and that old Lord Midas was going 
to pay expenses. 

Nothing but the idea that for once a Jewish drawing- 
room could supply her with even a greater novelty in the 
way of “talk” than the Bohemian purlieus of St. John’s 
Wood and Holland Park, fortified Mrs. Mossenthal in her 
intention of going to IMrs. Cohen’s on the Thursday follow- 
ing that lady’s awful revelations. Besides, she still enter- 
tained the idea of offering “ The Nest” to Mary as an 
autumn domicile. Yet, for aU that, she was torn another 
way too. 

Mr. Lancelot Tremayne had just had a first piece pro- 
duced at the St. George’s Theatre, and was going to cele- 
brate his accession to the ranks of the celebrities that very 
afternoon with a tea-party at his house in Bedford Park. 
Quite a number of actors and actresses would be there and 
all the lady reporters for the fashion papers, and the gather- 
ing would have been delightful. Now, alas! that new 
frock — seven and a half guineas at an Oxford Street sale — 
and that bonnet with the wings in front, the bows at the 
back, and the roses and tulips on the crown, would remain 
unrecorded among the toilettes of the year, for was not the 
Tremayne’ s tea the last party of the season? 

Mrs. Mossenthal turned quite livid with annoyance at 
the thought, while she ate her lunch, cutting up her food 
into minute and precise scraps and slipping them sideways 
into her tight mouth in a manner peculiarly her own. 

At four precisely she stej)ped across the threshold of 


WITHOUT SIN 


209 


Mrs. Cohen’s house in Westbourne Terrace. Gilt cornices, 
showy bead curtains, stuffy plush draperies, and gaudy 
pottery were dominant notes in the scheme of the decora- 
tion of both entrance and staircase. 

The drawing-room had a golden ceiling, which, by rea- 
son of its heavy, lowering effect, gave the visitor a head- 
ache, and the walls were covered in silk of peacock-green 
and gold. At least three pairs of curtains were hung and 
draped and tied across each window. Some figures of black 
boys, swathed in stiff red and blue drapery, stood either 
side of the fireplace. Large vases of Oriental ware, and 
small tables laden with toys of modern Dutch silver, were 
everywhere. The chairs and sofas were large, and on this 
hot afternoon appeared intolerably warm. All the win- 
dows were closed, and the general effect of the room was 
that of vulgar taste, unlimited expenditure, and considerable 
dirt. 

“Ah! my dear, punctuality was always your virtue,” 
cried Mrs. Cohen effusively, as she greeted Mrs. Mos- 
senthal. 

Mrs. Cohen was en grande tenuey which, as usual, con- 
sisted of a dark gown of silk, made exceedingly tight and 
covered with heavy masses of twinkling jet. She looked 
as though she were on the verge of strangulation, and fanned 
herself perpetually. 

Mrs. Mossenthal returned the greeting frigidly. She 
was still yearning after the flesh-pots of the Bedford Park 
tea-party, and had hoped to attain them if the little affair 
at Mrs. Cohen’s came off punctually. But every moment 
that ticked from the French clock edged with large paste 
diamonds put the celebrated Tremayne and his society 
gathering further away from attainment. 

The clock had chimed the first quarter before the aggres- 
sive clanging of the bell heralded another member of the 
14 


210 


WITHOUT SIN 


feminine Vehmgericht. The arrival was Mrs. Sam Abra- 
hams, a tall woman with a red face and black eyes. She 
wore a pink muslin frock and a Leghorn hat garnished with 
boughs of apple blossom. She was forty-five, but dressed 
youthfully on account of her waist and hips, which were 
small and girlish. Mrs. Nathaniel Lemon, who followed, 
had no romances left either about her age or appearance. 
The same greasy brown silk which she had worn on great 
occasions for three years past w^as drawn in worn puckers 
and folds about her fat, stayless body. She was very poor 
and was generally ignored by the Bayswater Jewesses, who 
long ago decided that Highbury was beyond the radius of 
an afternoon call. But she claimed a distant cousinshij) 
with ^Sac Mossenthal, and Mrs. Cohen had bidden her on 
this occasion with her two newly married daughters— large 
blowsy young women with beautiful eyes and loose masses 
of dark hair — with a view to keeping Mrs. Mossenthal’s 
self-importance in wholesome check. 

That lady was quick to note the move, and adroitly de- 
termined to play Mrs. Cohen at her own game. Forcing 
an expansive smile to her pinched mouth, she rose from her 
chair and bestowed a cordial greeting on Mrs. Nathaniel 
Lemon, inquiring with effusion after “Nattie,” and con- 
gratulating the brides, Mrs. Issachar and Mrs. Lionel 
Josefs, on their marriages. She hoped, in a loud voice, to 
see more of them in the autumn when she came back from 
the Continent, and then walked in triumph back to her seat. 
Mrs. Cohen, who had hoped to suppress Mrs. Mossenthal 
by the introduction of ^ Sac’s vulgar relations, was rather- 
nonplussed. Mrs. Dan Goldschmidt’s entrance diverted 
all the ladies. With her quick, bird-like movements and 
scarcely veiled coarse innuendos, she came as a revelation 
of a rather shocking sort to the party from Highbury. 

“ Could’nt get here before,” she chirped. “I hope the 


WITHOUT SIN 


211 


fair Mary has not been, and gone. But I’ve been lunch- 
ing at the Savoy with old Tompkins, of Fliihuj Moments. 
We’ve been talking the higher philosophy, till really I 
don’t know where I are. Do you know, Mrs. Abrahams, 
I often wonder how the world got on before that expres- 
sion, ‘Don’t know Avhere you are,’ came to be invented. 
It’s so intensely full of meaning, and comes in at all sorts 
of odd moments.” 

“ And I hope Mr. Tompkins is going to give us some- 
thing of yours in Flijimj Moments — a little story — or poem,” 
said ]Mrs. Cohen, by way of making conversation. She did 
not care tor Mrs. Dan Goldschmidt, and had been more 
than a little vexed that morning at hearing from her that 
she intended to look in that afternoon to “ see the fun.” 

“A story! a poem!” screamed Mrs. Dan Goldschmidt, 
shrilly, holding up in affected horror a pair of beautifully 
gloved little hands. “Heavens! I leave such twaddle to 
the misses who scribble a bit to add to their pocket-money. 
No. I believe in facing truths, calling a spade a spade. 
Why, the Park Magazine was turned off all the bookstalls 
last month because of my paper, ‘Sex Studies.’ People 
are so paltry, they like to talk about — well, about philoso- 
phy and water. I prefer the genuine thing. Now, I’ve 
promised Tompkins a paper on this business of Mary Lev- 
inge’s. That’s why I invited myself this afternoon. 

Mrs. Nathaniel Lemon and her daughters grew red. 
They were very proper, and nothing but a strict sense of 
the duty they owed to the family had induced them to risk 
meeting any one so dreadful as Mary Levinge that after- 
noon. 

Mrs. Cohen, too, looked hot and angry. She considered 
Mrs. Dan Goldschmidt a disgrace to a race which poses 
to claim both purity and virtue for its women. 

Mrs. Mossenthal, on the contrary, let a cold smile creep 


212 


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over her hard face. She felt that the unspeakable phases 
of life, as served up according to Mrs. Goldschmidt’s por- 
nographic tastes, might prove interesting and amusing, and 
perhaps compensate for that lost society function. 

Mrs. Montagu was announced. Her figure was still as 
charming as ever, though the roots of her carefully dark- 
ened hair gleamed silver-white under a fascinating bonnet. 
She and Mrs. Cohen had never been friends, for it was to 
the gossip concerning Mrs. Montagu and Eugene that Mrs. 
Cohen still attributed the failure of her son’s suit with 
Mary. 

But on such an occasion the two mothers made common 
cause ; either one of them might have had the misfortune 
to have been connected by marriage with that abandoned 
girl, who, mercifully for them, had preferred the company 
and houses and immoralities of the Gentiles to an honoured 
and becoming alliance among her own people. 

They were still condoling and congratulating one another, 
when for the last time the folding doors, panelled with 
mirrors and decked with gilt carvings, were flung open, 
and Mary Levinge was ushered in. 

The face of every woman present froze into an expres- 
sion of virtuous horror, as Mary advanced towards Mrs. 
Cohen, and said with her pretty smile : 

“ How kind of you to let me know that you would be at 
home to-day.” 

MrSi . Cohen gave her a flabby hand-shake, Mrs. Mossen- 
thal a firmer grasp, for she intended to advance her country 
house at once. Mrs. Dan Goldschmidt stood on the tips of 
her tiny toes and kissed the girl; she did it to shock the 
rest. Mrs. Nathaniel Lemon bowed, her daughters peeped 
beneath their lowered lids at the first “ wicked woman” 
they had ever seen, as though she were an object of fearful 
curiosity. Mrs. Montagu bent ostentatiously over the tea 


WITHOUT SIN 


218 


table, and began to lisp in a high-pitched drawl to Mrs. 
Abrahams, who, in her efforts to bow to Mary without 
incurring the great Mrs. Montagu’s notice and consequent 
displeasure, became purple in the face. 

Accepting a chair by Mrs. Mossenthal, and a cup of tea, 
Mary sat down amid a silence which deepened moment by 
moment. 

The Lemon contingent had not spoken at all, Mrs. Mon- 
tagu’s lisp was extinguished under a large mouthful of 
almond cake, and even Mrs. Dan Goldschmidt’s purposeless 
chatter died in a nervous giggle. 

“ How hot town has been this last week, and how glad 
every one will be to flit to clearer air,” said Mary, rather 
wearily, and sipping her tea. 

She looked indeed as though the heat had dragged her 
terribly. Heavy bistre lines circled her gentle eyes, the 
pale hair lay dull and lustreless beneath the shadow of her 
wide white hat, and her mouth was drawn from a curving 
bow into a pitifully tired droop. Her right hand, from 
which she had pulled the long suede glove, was slender to 
transparency, and the tiny jingle of the big flashing rings 
upon her too slight fingers, touched a chord of womanly 
sympathy in Mrs. Nathaniel Lemon’s commonplace, 
motherly heart. 

It wdll indeed be pleasant to get away,” said Mrs. Cohen, 
opening the attack on the unsuspecting girl cautiously. 
“ London has not been a very congenial place of abode to 
some of us just lately.” 

“I think it ith a pity the theathon didn’t end a month 
ago,” lisped Mrs. Montagu, through another mouthful of 
cake. 

“ Or that some people didn’t go away before this,” feebly 
mumbled Mrs. Abrahams, in support of her social superior. 

Now was Mrs. Mossenthal’s chance. 


214 


WITHOUT SIN 


“ Perhaps, Mary, you have nowhere to go that you care 
about. But ’ Sac and I are ordered abroad for the autumn, 
and then meant to come straight back to Cleveland Square, 
and we shall be pleased if you will go to ‘The Nest,’ our 
place in Essex, and stay there as long as you like.” 

Mrs. MossenthaPs angular form heaved and swelled with 
pride as she made the offer. Neither Mrs. Cohen nor Mrs. 
Montagu, with all their money and airs, had a country 
house to lend any one. 

“ Thanks very much, you and Mr. Mossenthal are most 
kind, ” said Mary, turning shining eyes of gratitude on Mrs. 
Mossenthal. “ Another time I shall be delighted, for every 
one says ‘The Nest’ is charming. But although Lady St. 
Cyprien has pressed me to spend the next two months with 
her in Scotland, I have decided to stay on in town.” 

“To stay?” asked Mrs. Cohen. 

“Certainly to stay, at any rate for a few months.” 
Unwittingly, Mary had thrown down the gauntlet. Amid 
a dead silence, Mrs. Cohen and Mrs. Mossenthal exchanged 
glances. Who was going to pick it up? Who would be 
the first to point out to this girl the scandal she was about 
to bring upon the community? 

The air in the hot, vulgar drawing-room grew heavy. 
No one moved but Mrs. Dan Goldschmidt, who settled her- 
self in her chair, prepared to thoroughly enjoy something 
which would be even better fun than higher philosophy. 

Mrs. Cohen shut her fan, cleared her throat and began : 

“ My dear Mary, we were all friends of your poor, dear 
grandfather’s, and since his death we have taken consider- 
able interest in you and much thought for your welfare, 
though you have so openly cut yourself adrift from us all, 
and have shown an undue preference for the society of those 
who are not of our ancient faith.” 

Mrs. Nathaniel Lemon, who considered all Christians 


WITHOUT SIN 


215 


outcasts, sighed piously. Mrs. Goldschmidt sniggered into 
her handkerchief. 

Mary coloured slightly. 

“ Lord and Lady St. Cyprien were faithful patrons of 
my grandfather, and have been kind to me since my child- 
hood. 

“ Their friendship does not seem to have done you much 
good lately,” said Mrs. Mossenthal sourly. 

The coarse insinuation struck home — Mary flushed scar- 
let, and putting down her tea-cup, attempted to rise, but 
Mrs. Cohen laid a hot, heavy hand on her arm and kept her 
in her seat. 

“ Now, Mary, you are not going to leave this house before 
we, who are all old family friends, have pointed out to you 
the disrepute and scandal you are bringing upon your 
people. Oh! my dear — you needn^t look as though you 
didn’t understand what I meant. We all know what has 
happened, and what is going to happen.” 

It was curious to watch the women’s dark Eastern faces, 
as they gathered round their prey, shed every shadow of 
the veneer of Western civilization, acquired with such pains 
through the long centuries. They were suddenly trans- 
formed into the hawk-nosed, cruel, brainless animals who 
peep from the latticed windows, or lurk in the dusky door- 
ways of Syrian townships and Mauresque hamlets. 

Even the fat features of the Highbury party hardened in 
the lust for vengeance on the woman who had fallen. 

We know that misfortunes will arise,” went on Mrs. 
Cohen, her society manner disappearing so fast that no one 
would have been surprised to see her put her arms akimbo. 
“ God forbid that we should be hard judges upon those who 
are so overtaken. We are all married women.” She looked 
around her as though to reassure herself on that point, 
“and are thankful for our husbands and our children.” 


216 


WITHOUT SIN 


The two brides blushed deeply; and Mrs. Mosseiithal, who 
was childless, and held ’Sac in contempt, fiwned. “But 
such mercies should never blind us to the failings of others 
— whom we should pity — if they deserve it.” 

She snorted and stared straight at Mary, who, entirely 
bewildered at the sudden attack made on her, sat transfixed 
with amazement. 

“ But when people do not deserve it ” continued Mrs. 

Cohen, who was growing intoxicated with the sound of her 
own voice. 

“ When they flaunt about without shame among Gentiles,” 
said Mrs. Abrahams, from beneath her juvenile hat. 

“And refuthe fine marriageth ath thougli they didn’t 
care about living rethpectably among their own people,” 
spluttered Mrs. Montagu. 

“ When the well-meant offers of their own relations to 
give them a chance of going into retirement for a time are 
treated with scorn,” cried Mrs. Mossenthal spitefully. 

“ Then there can be no pity or forgiveness, and we feel 
bound to tell you that we cannot continue to know you or 
visit you,” perorated Mrs. Cohen, unfurling her fan and 
resuming her society air. 

Mary looked from one woman to another as each spoke, 
with childish, frightened eyes. She had a vague idea that 
they were vexed with her for preferring Lady St. Cyprien’s 
society and set to their own circle; but her gentle nature 
could not conceive that she had been trapped into Mrs. 
Cohen’s house to be browbeaten and scolded by these women, 
to whom she yielded neither submission nor affection. 

A plea for some explanation w'as rising to her lips, when 
Mrs. Dan Goldschmidt, flinging one leg over the other, and 
flicking a crumb from her skirt, cried in her most airy 
manner : 

“Who’s the man, Mary?” 


WITHOUT SIN 


217 


Pure aud sinless as the girl was, the insolent insinuation 
dragged aside for ever the veil of immaculate innocence 
behind which her intelligence had lain hidden. 

Those words, coarse and base, uttered by a woman of the 
lowest moral grade, let in that awful light, ‘‘the opinion of 
the world,” upon her soul. 

Amongst those other friends of hers, friends who were 
foreign to her race, alien to her belief, whatever of doubt, 
of wonder, of sorrow there might be, no words save those 
of love and faith had been spoken in her presence. It had 
remained for her own people, whom she still hoped to 
redeem and restore, to cast the first stone at her. 

With the blood rushing to her face as though she had 
been struck, she rose to her feet, looking so grandly tall in 
her slender height, so royally simple in her straight white 
robe, among these large-boned, over-dressed Jewesses. 

“ What man, you say? You believe I have a lover — 
because I am going to give to the world the earthly embodi- 
ment of a spirit? Are you so forgetful of our old beliefs, 
so ignorant of the tenets of our grand religion, that you 
will not understand? Have the prophets taught in vain, 
and the books they have written been read to deaf ears? 
You are Jewesses — daughters of an outcast race — a scat- 
tered nation. Have you no credence in the promise of our 
God, who has sworn to lead us to our own again? Have 
you no pride of birth that makes you yearn for the countries 
and the cities which once were yours by right of conquest? 
Do you none of you desire to behold your children’s chil- 
dren numbered and honoured among the nations of the 
world? Ah! you are wilfully blind, in that you will not 
see that the great fulfilment of the prophet’s words is at 
hand. You are obstinately deaf when you will not hear 
that our God and the God of our fathers is about to redeem 
the promise made to us, in the hour of our most just 


218 


WITHOUT SIN 


punishment — and that I — I who speak to you now — have 
been chosen as the poor instrument for your salvation.’^ 

Mrs. Mossenthal shrugged her high shoulders scornfully, 
and Mrs. Montagu sneered all over her pretty, Southern face. 

Mary looked round at her tormentors, and the chaste dis- 
dain of the maid for the matron rose in her throat. 

“Ah! you women, who boast of your virtue in that you 
have borne children to your husbands. Where is your con- 
tinence of body, your purity of soul ; you who have lain in 
the arms of men and been subject to them? What is your 
love but lust, what are your marriage vows but the gratifi- 
cation of base desires? Yet you scorn me, who am soilless 
from the touch of man, virgin even of his kisses. You 
dare to tell me that you will not know me, that I have 
sinned, and am fit only to be cast out from among the com- 
pany of honest women. Honest! Why, it is you, the wives 
of men, the mothers of the offspring of men, who are 
unclean! It is you who are not worthy — except to beat 
your breasts and pray to our God for mercy. Pray to my 
child — conceived of no mortal — who is to be born of a pure 
virgin — pray that he will teach you charity and meekness 
of spirit.” 

Torn by the passion of her outraged womanhood, lashed 
by the coarse tongues and coldly contemptuous eyes of the 
women about her, Mary Levinge poured forth her indict- 
ment and her justification till her flesh failed; then, white 
as her gown and shaking like a leaf, she sank, sick and 
faint, upon her knees. 

The dead silence about her roused her as no words could 
have done, and with the subsidence of her passion the sweet 
spirit of gentleness and humility possessed her once again. 
With feeble, outstretched hands, and a voice which emotion 
had rendered flat and almost inaudible, she pleaded to the 
women about her. 


WITHOUT SIN 


219 


“ Pardon me, I pray, and may God forgive me to for my 
harsh words. What you have said to me to-day is but a 
test of my strength, a tithe of my probation, and I was 
weak and have failed. I am sorry.” 

She rose, and with bowed head and slow steps, even as 
though she were indeed the sinner the women would fain 
have branded her, Mary quitted the room. 

Mrs. Issachar Josefs, who was already in delicate health, 
broke the silence which followed Mary’s exit with a noisy 
sob, and was at once removed by her mother in a cab. The 
others drifted away in various stages of scepticism and 
amusement. 

As Mrs. Dan Goldschmidt went downstairs with Mrs. 
Mossenthal, she said: 

“ Well, I don’t think she should have insulted us about 
the men like that, do you?” 

Mrs. Mossenthal, who always admitted the impeachment 
of lovers, smiled palely as she entered her brougham. 


CHAPTER XXIY 


A November fog hung over London. In Oxford Street 
and in the West End it was yellow, and acrid with sulphur 
in the mouth. The gas-lamps burned with a pallid flicker, 
and the fiery red eyes of the swiftly rolling hansoms looked 
bleared as they flashed noiselessly by. 

Up on the higher plane of Regent’s Park the fog was 
white and soft as carded wool. It lay in billowy waves 
over the black hollow of the ornamental lake, and hid in 
fleecy folds the sleeping water-fowl from every sense save 
that of sound. 

Now and again a chill sad wind passed mourning through 
the gaunt bare trees, and then the white mist rose and fell, 
swirled and heaved like an intangible, silent sea. 

It was late; past midnight, and the faint lights which 
had jewelled the many windows of the houses in the Outer 
and Inner Circles had died out one by one. 

But through the thick belt of trees that grew round Holm- 
hurst a few points of light glittered, while the sharp 
crunching of wheels on the gravel drive or the impatient 
rattle of a champed bit, showed that even at that time of 
night there were visitors at Mary Levinge’s home. 

The great drawing-room, with the elaborately gilt and 
painted ceiling, the w^alls of white silk, gleaming statuary, 
and massed palms, looked very empty and desolate in the 
radiance of the electric light, which, from beneath cream- 
hued shades of fluted silk, gemmed the room with points of 
flame. A big fire of beech logs crackled and sputtered on 


WITHOUT SIN 


221 


the wide hearth, and foiiglit the’ chill, thick fog back to the 
deep bays of the ceiling. A iiiooii-faced clock in a richly 
carved case ticked slumbrously from a far corner, and with 
the restless fluttering of some caged birds, awakened by the 
light, alone stirred the heavy silence of the room. 

Two people, a man and a woman, broke with their still, 
stiff figures and plain black clothes the garish splendour of 
the drawing-room. Both were there for the same reason, 
the hopes of both were fixed on the same goal, the ears of 
both were straining for the same cry, and yet Lady Theo 
Bellastier, the frivolous society woman, and Martin Baird, 
the manager of a Bond Street art shop and the paid servant 
of Mary Levinge, had never been so far apart. 

Lady Theo, with all the chilly instincts of her sex and 
order, was curled in a wide chair close to the hearth. Her 
gown of black stuff was ostentatiously simple, and the 
rebellion of her bright curling hair was hidden beneath the 
prim, hard edges of a little flat straw bonnet. Her hands 
and ears were bare of all jewellery, but her femininity and 
love of finery cried aloud from the coils of a rare rosary and 
cross of 7iiello work which hung from her slender waist to 
the floor. 

Her face was set in grave lines, and her big grey eyes 
glistened in the fire-flames with unaccustomed tears. 
Mingled with her feverish religious fervours, the formula 
for which she had made for herself from half a dozen faiths, 
was the remembrance of those dark hours in her own bril- 
liant life, when she, too, had striven in mortal agony 
through the Valley of the Dark ShadoAv, and with it, and 
the memory of the tiny dead creature they had told her was 
her child, came the regret for wasted years and the pitiful 
wonderment whether all might have been different had her 
daughter lived. 

When she danced and flirted, drove her blood horses in the 


222 


WITHOUT SIN 


Park, or gabbled and grinned through the smoke-wreaths 
and wine fumes across a card-table, the memory of that 
time seemed beyond recall, but in moments of solitude, 
when she went to church, or in the grey dawn counted her 
losses, or when she watched and waited in silence as she 
was now doing, the vision of a wee, waxen face slipped 
between her and all the world. 

And what of Martin Baird, sitting stiffly on a couch by 
the door, his large hands clasped patiently on his knees, 
and his grey head and thin face bowed upon his breast? 
Neither the desire for a new religion nor the memory of a 
dead past filled his aching heart. There, there was no 
room for ought else beyond an ardent anxiety for the grand- 
daughter of the man who had saved him from starvation— 
and worse; a heavy grief for that little one whom he had 
known and loved, carried and caressed since the first hour 
she had run, the one fresh, young thing among a crowd of 
antiquities, to greet him. His faithful heart ached and his 
man’s soul sickened to know that she so pure, so innocent, 
so craving of the world’s protection, was crossing, with 
infinite anguish, that awful path which divides for ever 
girlhood from womanhood, and that the passage was being 
made with never a mother’s voice, or the touch of a hus- 
band’s hand, to aid and to encourage. 

The sound of swiftly descending feet roused Lady Theo 
from her dreams, in which miracles and manifestations in 
the near future mingled with her personal past. She had 
scarcely time to brush the tears from her lashes — she would 
blush less to be caught cheating at cards than crying — when 
the door was flung wide and Noel Marrable entered. 

Is it over?” she cried, springing to her feet. 

^‘Not yet, but I don’t believe in too many doctors,” he 
answered, almost roughly. 

He put her out of his path and went over to where a 


WITHOUT SIN 


223 


small table stood, glittering with cut-glass decanters and 
silver dishes. 

He looked very pale, and Lady Theo, as she watched him 
pour out a liqueur of brandy, thought she had never till 
now noticed how much he had changed of late. 

He did not speak again, and Lady Theo crept back to 
lier chair. The fire was burning low and the heavy fog 
was wreathing round the bright lamps and misting the clear 
outlines of the pictures. 

It grew very cold in the great gorgeous room. Lady 
Theo fell into a light doze and awoke shivering from a 
dream that she was walking through a biting snowstorm. 
Baird was so still that he, too, might have slept. But 
Marrable — perhaps to keep warm — paced to and fro, an 
ever-restless, gliding figure. Only he walked with a 
strangely light footfall, which unconsciously slackened 
every time he passed the door, as though he feared to miss 
some sound from above — the groan of a woman in direst 
pain, or perhaps the first feeble wail of a new-born child. 

The logs had died into white dust between the polished 
silver fire-dogs, and the new November day was three hours 
old before the strained ears of those who waited caught a 
swift footfall on the stairs. 

Marrable sprang to the door, and opened it, while Baird 
rose gaunt and grey from his seat as Lady St. Cyprien 
entered. Anxiety and pity had scored deep furrows on her 
face, but the tears which filled her dark eyes were of thank- 
fulness and joy. 

“ It is as she said. Mary has a son,” she cried, catching 
at Lady Theo’s outstretched hands and kissing her in an 
uncontrollable access of womanly emotion. 

“A miracle! A miracle is accomplished! The prophecy 
is fulfilled!” cried Lady Theo, flinging herself on her knees 
in a frenzy of religious fervour, and bursting into tears. 


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“A sen! Can such things be?” said Baird, with wonder 
and sorrow. 

Marrable’s dark face grew grey in the amber light, and 
a stifled sob caught his throat. Yet it was with his most 
impassive air that he crossed the room and rang the bell 
sharply. 

“It is very cold here and the fire is out. Have it 
relighted at once,” he ordered the servant who answered 
the summons. “And bring some tea. These ladies must 
have something before they go home.” 


CHAPTEE XXV 


Mary\s son was a fine, handsome child, perfect in form 
and limb, and marvellously like his mother in the gentle- 
ness and serenity of his disposition. 

“He is a little angel, ’’ said the nurse every day, when 
she laid the lovely babe, robed in cobweb lawn and filmy 
lace, beside Mary’s pillow. 

The faces which pressed for hours so close together, one 
pale and delicate, almost to ideality, with suffering and 
weakness, the other small and round, full and pink, with a 
life that throbbed stronger every day, were wonderfully simi- 
lar. The baby had the same low broad forehead crossed 
by pale pencilled brows and shaded by floss-like rings of 
hair; thick white lids lifted above the elongated grey eyes, 
and when the wee mouth broke into fleeting smiles, the re- 
semblance was complete. 

Sometimes, Lady St. Cyprien unconsciously looked for 
the impress of some other personality on the child’s delicate 
feature and fair colouring, but always in vain. She hated 
herself for doing so, and breathed a prayer of thankfulness 
that she could not discover that which she sought, but 
feared to find. Yet she was human and a woman, and 
doubts and wonderings would come unbidden, till again she 
caught herself gazing on the innocent, and seeking for 
traces of the guilty. 

During the first weeks of her illness, Mary, whose moral 
fibre had weakened with her tortured body, had yielded a 
complete submission to the great wave of maternity which 
15 


226 


WITHOUT SIN 


at the first wail of her infant had arisen from unseen depths 
and overwhelmed her. Without a struggle, she had bowed 
her head before the waters of human instinct, and with 
scarcely a memory of past dreams, or a flutter of future 
hopes, she abandoned herself resistlessly to the animal 
passion of the great mother-love. 

With a crushing weakness numbing her limbs within the 
downy depths of her luxurious bed, and her brain feather- 
light from fever and pain, she could yet thrill hotly at the 
first sound of the babbling ^‘coo” of her baby boy. The 
touch of the warm round cheek against her own bloodless 
face, the groping paddle of the tiny, pink-palmed hands in 
the satiny curves of her throat and bosom, filled her with 
an ecstasy that throbbed like pain. 

She forgot to praise her God according to her lifelong 
belief that He had sent her people a redeemer, but she 
hourly thanked the Providence that had given her a 
child. 

Her convalescence was very slow, and she — perhaps with 
a prophetic fear that with returning health, the ideal would 
edge about the real — showed an almost morbid dislike to 
leaving her room. She would be moved to a sofa some- 
times, and with the sleeping child held in the warm hollow 
of her arm would bask the winter afternoon through before 
the crackling logs and leaping flames. 

It was before the cheerful fire, too, that her slender hands 
found strength enough to perform a hundred offices for her 
most dear infant. With soft twittering sounds and little 
smiles and nods that come so naturally to a mother, she 
would lay the cooing baby on her knees, and one by one, 
lingering with infinite tenderness over each dainty fasten- 
ing, she would loose the round dimpled limbs from all 
swathings and let him kick and leap as young things love to 
do. Then would her pale, sad mouth part in happy laughter 


WITHOUT SIN 


227 


and her tear- washed eyes dance with delight over each tiny 
dimple and every delicious curve. 

It was lier greatest glory, too, to bathe the child, gravely 
testing with her unringed hands the water’s heat, and 
smiling back m her baby’s face as he caught at the sponge 
and crowed at the fluffy perfumed powder-puff. 

Those were the days when she jealously concerned her- 
self with every detail of the child’s life, when his waking 
eyes were reflected in her watching ones, and when he 
nestled to sleep above her full heart; when every little cry 
was a torture, but every dimpling smile or feeble finger- 
clutch of recognition was an agony of delight. 

Yet among these fair days, filled to the brim wdth the 
stainless love of maternity, came unbidden hours of dread 
of that great and awful future which was to raise the barrier 
of divinity between herself and her child. The marvellous 
fulfilment of her girlish dreams, the prophecy concerning 
her race’s redemption, which she was confident had been 
realised through her own person, overwhelmed her with 
vague terrors. She was a woman, with a woman’s heart 
and frail body, human to the core, and with the first love 
of her life growing hourly stronger within her. But her 
child — her little baby — her one darling, was beyond 
humanity, and beyond everything but reverential wor- 
ship. 

When those dark days came upon her, a very savagery of 
mother-love would seize her. She could not be induced to 
leave her bed, or to admit any one beyond her attendants, 
to her room. Not for one moment would she permit any 
one to touch the child, but, with the infant clasped closely 
to her breast, would fence him within her arms, as a dumb 
creature in the face of a coming danger essays to shelter its 
offspring with its poor body. It was as though she felt 
that in the inviolable privacy of her down pillows and 


228 


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silken coverings there lay the great safety and peace of her 
life to come. 

During those happy but too short weeks every sentiment 
of a woman’s nature which should be dedicated to the 
glories of love were concentrated by Mary on her child. 
The image of no man had ever shadowed her virgin mind, 
the voice of no lover had ever stirred the slumbering echoes 
of her pure heart. There had been no husband with pas- 
sion’s touch to fire her maiden’s soul ; there was only the 
child. And the child who had awakened the lover received 
it all. But with reviving forces the past came back, and 
the future filled the horizon, and on the last day of the 
dying year the first act of the sacrifice of the flesh to the 
spirit was faced and consummated. Mary moved into the 
boudoir, which adjoined her bedroom. 

Outside, the great stretches of the Park lay gaunt and 
drab under the wet embraces of a dripping fog, but within 
there was the scent of hot-house flowers and the shaded 
glow of lamps, low voices and soft footsteps, and the 
musical tinkle of rare china and old silver from the tea- 
table. 

Wrapped in a costly gown of velvet and fine furs, Mary 
sat in a deep chair before the fire. Her eyes, looking 
larger than usual in her pale face, were fixed upon the glow- 
ing mass; her hands, palms upwards, lay inert and nerve- 
less on her knees. Outwardly calm and cold as a statue, a 
very tempest of doubt and misery was tearing at her heart, 
where the love of the mother and the adoration of the wor- 
shipper were holding mighty battle. 

The whole drift of her previous life, the very strength of 
her present belief, rendered it impossible that she should 
love her child as her child, indulge all the tender familiari- 
ties and the sweet homely intercourse, or revel in the dar- 
ling delights of maternity which were granted to the poorest 


WITHOUT SIN 


229 


and meanest of womankind. She had given birth to one 
who was not of her soul, though he was of her body ; who, 
where she must die, would live; where she might fail, 
must redeem. 

Her love must be tempered with reverence, her adoration 
must be touched by fear. The mother must be absorbed in 
the mere instrument of a divine clemency; the queen of the 
child must be the subject of the deity. 

So with her own hands she had put her sleeping baby 
away from her bleeding heart, and, with arms that ached 
to snatch him back again, had voluntarily and for the first 
time laid him in a cradle. 

And as the child slept on amid the dim rosy shadow of 
the silken curtains, Mary stared blindly into the fire and 
prayed as she had never prayed before for strength; 
strength to strangle the passion of motherhood ; strength to 
build up a fit temple in her heart fur the worship of him 
who one day would lead her people back to their own; 
strength to reduce all her love and yearnings within the 
limits of a wise guidance and a sweet friendship; strength 
to fulfil to the end her mission, which had but just begun. 

Yet for all her high beliefs and stern purpose, the pros- 
pect before her was a dreary one; but, once she had set 
her face, the quiet courage and determination of her nature 
helped her feet down the road, though her heart-strings 
snapped in agony at every step. 

With her beautiful angePs face set like a mask and her 
empty hands before her, she prayed — and prayed again, 
and as the storm died down within her she thought that the 
answer, and strength, had come to her. 

But the child stirred in his cradle and wailed fretfully, 
and Mary, with her heart in her throat and the blood flying 
to her pale brow, with outstretched hands and cooing lips, 
was at his side. Then remembrance, sharp and stabbing, 


230 


WITHOUT SIN 


struck. The first lesson both for herself and her son had 
to be taught and learnt at once. She turned, and pulled 
the bell loudly. 

“ Take up the child; he is crying!” she said to the nurse 
who came. She was shaking like a leaf as she spoke, but 
her voice was low and almost cold. 

When Lady St. Cyprien called an hour later, Mary was 
sitting a little distance from the cradle, watching — poor 
self-starved soul — with wide, hungry eyes, the baby, who 
was awake, and babbling to himself and his tasselled cur- 
tains, those sweet, strange inarticulations which are heaven’s 
own music to a mother’s ears. 

‘‘Not nursing the baby, Mary?” cried Lady St. Cyprien, 
as she kissed the girl. “Why, what revolution have we 
here? Or is it that the young man already scorns to be 
nursed?” She bent over the cradle, and chirrupped and 
nodded at the baby, who chuckled back at her. “ You 
bonny boy, are you going to throw aside your mother’s love 
already ?” 

Mary drew her from the cradle. 

“You forget,” she said, very sadly. “T am his mother; 
but he is not my son. He is a great trust confided to me 
for a time only. But we must not set too great a store on 
that which is not our own.” 

The weariness of the flesh and the lowliness of the spirit 
filled for a moment her eyes with heavy tears, and caught 
her voice in a thick sob; but she conquered again as she 
had conquered before, and a little later said, quietly : 

“ Sit here and watch him playing with those tassels. He 
is so happy. He needs no mother.” 

This was indeed to be The Mother of Sorrows. 


CHAPTER XXVI 


The New Year was born amid clear, bright days and 
brilliant, frosty nights. Mary gained strength daily, and 
the faint rose-bloom, which had been one of her girlish 
charms, again touched the pure pallor of her face with 
colour. 

It was then that Mrs. Marx emerged from the exotic 
atmosphere of her own apartments, and, after a feeble 
attempt at compressing her tawdry finery within the limits 
of a cab-load of luggage, cast from off her feet the dust of 
Holmhurst. 

A young Jewish preacher in the East End had convinced 
her that by living under Mary’s roof she was jeopardising 
her soul’s welfare, and so an incoherent explanation with 
Mary, followed by an effusive farewell, cut for ever the 
frail tie which had existed between aunt and niece. 

To Mary the severance was almost unfelt. Even in the 
days when the family had all lived over the Art Gallery in 
Bond Street, Mrs. Marx had been little more in the child’s 
life than a tangible nonentity. Since the death of Ephraim 
Levinge she had faded into a vague presence, who was 
unseen and unheard in the Holmhurst household for month 
after month. The link of sex sympathy had never been 
forged between them, and, despite Mrs. Marx’s strong 
Judaism, the bond of blood had proved but weak with her. 

But now she had gone, and Mary, though she never 
missed her, thought a little sadly there was one less soul in 
the world she might think of as a friend. 


232 


WITIIOVT SIX 


For ill those days Mary Leviiige, the great iieiress and 
the beauty of a season, was very much alone. The Jew^s 
had cast her and her great faith from them, for though the 
very root of their religion lies in the belief that he who 
shall redeem them shall be borne of a pure virgin, the 
scepticism of the West had long ago overgrown the simpler 
Oriental faiths. The prophet’s words were often read 
to them, and were an article of their belief, and perhaps 
deep in some hearts were retained as a promise of the 
great future : but before the world they sneered and 
laughed, as at the idea of the fulfilment of a fallacy, the 
men holding her a ninny for so trumpeting her shame 
abroad, the women openly shoulder-shrugging and rejoic- 
ing at her social downfall. 

But Lady St. Cyprien and Lady Theo Ballastier remained 
her staunch and true friends. Lady Theo firmly and 
frankly believed that Mary was a virgin mother, and her 
child of no earthly parentage. Her jaded palate and dulled 
sensibilities, biases of every flavour in the world’s me?iu of 
pleasures or excitement, had caught and clung to the one 
really fresh element which had ever touched her life. A 
thoughtless, superstition, which passed for religion and a 
certain weariness of the flesh, which did duty very well 
for a desire to give up the world and its vanities, led her 
day by day to Holmhurst, where she would sit in Mary’s 
boudoir, gazing enraptured at the child, or work herself 
into a violent ecstasy of prayer before the Madonna’s por- 
trait. Mary had all unwittingly provided Lady Theo with 
a fresh sensation, and opened a new offshoot from fashion’s 
monotonous pathway. To wear a black stuff gown from 
morning to night, and a plain bonnet ; to sedulously banish 
all the ripples and curls from her golden head ; to give up 
cards and betting, champagne suppers and rowdy Sunday 
dinners, entailed sacrifices which were, in Lady Theo’s 


WITHOUT SIN 


233 


eyes, redolent of atonenieiit for the past and prophetic of 
virtue’s rewards in the future. A vague personal gratitude 
towards the woman and the circumstances who had stirred 
her soul to an awakening, mingled strangely with her ill- 
regulated religious aspirations. 

But with Lady St. Cyprien it was neither the cult of a 
new mania nor the idle pursuit of a novel sensation which 
led her most afternoons of the week into the scented 
warmth and gracious surroundings of Mary’s favourite sit- 
ting-room. The first intensity of her sorrow for the girl’s 
condition, and the bitterness of disappointment that her 
nephew’s marriage was rendered impossible, had, even be- 
fore the birth of the little one, died in the tenderest pity. 
And with that pity, which was as the heart-broken sym- 
pathy of a loving mother with an erring child, grew a 
sincere respect for a woman who in her hours of direst 
anguish and mortal pain could so preserve her own counsel. 

For, worldly-wise and yet not world-hardened, Lady St. 
Cyprien could but regard the birth of Mary’s child as the 
natural sequel of Mary’s fall. Never a fanciful or imagina- 
tive woman, she could believe with a sound orthodox belief 
in the miracle of eighteen hundred years ago. It was her 
creed, and had been the faith of her family for generations. 
But that such a manifestation was to be, or could be, re- 
peated, never struck her. The girl’s wild talk in the past 
had never meant more to her evenly balanced mind than 
the rather fanciful dreamings of a neurotic girl finding vent 
in speech. The vision which Mary claimed to have seen 
had been to her merely a more determined effort of a ner- 
vous, highly strung imagination, and she had trusted all 
along to the strength and tenderness of Stansdale as a hus- 
band to divert the girl’s mind into healthier and wider 
channels. 

But now, with the tangible presence of the beautiful, 


234 


WITHOUT SIN 


sleeping baby before her, with the trembling adoration of 
a saint, and the holy love of maternity shining from Mary’s 
soft eyes, how was she to regard that past? Surely not as 
the vague vision of an excitable child, bred in solitude and 
brought up on the weavings of a dreamy Scotchman’s tales. 
To believe in an Immaculate Conception was, with Lady 
St. Cyprien, full of sturdy common -sense and intense prac- 
tibility, beyond all her powers of desire or will. But the 
same flash of thought which dismissed the idea as absurd, 
put aside with equal decision the suspicion that Mary Le- 
vinge had deliberately sinned. 

But that supposition brought Lady St. Cyprien face to 
face with a dead wall, and drove her back again on the 
incredible problem of Mary’s purity and Mary’s mother- 
hood. The two things were irreconcilable, but Lady St. 
Cyprien was not a woman to be beaten. She contented her 
large heart with loyalty to and love for the girl, and forced 
her sense of wonderment to rest. One day the truth, 
whether it were for good or for ill, would be revealed. 
Time, or accident, would supply the missing clue. 

For the moment there was nothing to do but to visit 
Mary, cheer her long days, help her with tender solicitude 
through the wearinesses of a fluctuating convalescence, and 
sometimes fight her battles out in the world. 

Not that Mary was much missed or even regretted in the 
drawing-rooms through which she had flashed as an heiress 
and a lovely girl for a few months. A few wise mothers 
preached to rebellious daughters from the text, “Thou 
shalt not be found out,” and cited the dead art dealer’s 
granddaughter as an awful example. But Mary had never 
cheapened herself to that low level which, in Society, means 
popularity. She had never panted, half-naked, in the 
arms of strange men, in the riotous delights of an after- 
supper “ Barn” dance. Her curved lips had never babbled 


WITHOUT SIN 


235 


uncleaiiiiess with all the added salacious charm of affected 
ignorance. She had never professed the knowledge of the 
matron, while posing as a maid. No man could claim to 
have “ stood her a dinner” sa?ts chaperon at a smart restau- 
rant. She had neither smoked nor betted. She had merely 
been pretty and dull, rich and proper. Why should Society 
trouble its frivolous head and shallow heart about her? 
She was gone ; there were plenty more of the same sort to 
take her place. Among the Israelitish circles of Bays water 
and Portland Place she lived a little longer in the Chronlques 
Scandaleuses of stuffy, over-decorated drawing-rooms, until 
about the middle of January when a disturbance arose in 
the Mossenthal menage. It was not mentionable among 
young people, and Mary and her comparatively common- 
place lapse were shelved in favour of a spicier and more 
ticklesome dish of gossip. 

Once a week Martin Baird called at Holmhurst, and as 
Mary grew stronger, the little quiet dinners on Friday even- 
ings and sometimes a chat about the Bond Street business 
followed. He was always bright and cheerful with Mary, 
and cooed and clucked at the laughing child as though to 
the manner born ; but when the great front door swung to 
behind him, and he set out to walk down the lonely tree- 
fringed roadway of the Inner Circle, his grey head fell 
upon his chest, and his rough, hard face would soften with 
dead reminiscences when the mother he had just left was 
herself a child, treading with airy feet and floating pale 
gold hair, among the carved oak and rare porcelain, the 
tapestries and pictures, and old gilt furniture in the Art 
Gallery. The past, filled with legends and stories, frag- 
ments of the world’s history, and the weaved imaginings 
of dreamers’ brains, rose up and reproached him. How 
far the present was born of that past he could not know, 
only at times a great regret and self-reproach filled his 


236 


WITHOUT SIN 


heart. Perhaps it had all been his fault, and — yet he had 
always been so fond of her. 

Once Mr. Bertie Chant had called and left a card at Holm- 
hurst. He had thought the matter over, and determined 
that though for the moment it might imperil his position in 
society, he would run” Mary Levinge and the new cult 
in The FiccndlUy Gazette. If the subject were smartly 
treated, he felt confident that in common gratitude she 
would make it worth his while. But two days later, while 
his'scheme for pushing her was still in embryo, he was sent 
for by Mr. Corney Frankheimer, the latest and vulgarest 
thing in Cape millionaires. Mr Frankheimer desired a big 
house, a racing stud, a large visiting list, and advertise- 
ment. Mr. Bertie Chant thought that all these ambitions 
could be gratified — at a price — and so called no more at 
Holmhurst. 

For the rest, Mr. Erastus Bawdon, loud-voiced and rever- 
ential, and Dr. Marrable, quiet and coldly professional, 
were sometimes seen in Mary’s boudoir about the hour 
when the wintry dusk swept like a wave across the deserted 
Park, and when the silver and china of the tea-table glit- 
tered and jingled in the firelight. 


CHAPTEK XXVII 


February’s afternoons were already fringing the dreary 
winter daj's with glorious sunsets of crimson and gold, but 
in spite of the lingering light outside, Mary still persisted 
in having her lamps of wrought silver and rare bronze lit 
quite early in the afternoons. She had all the instinctive 
love for light and colour and warmth of her people, and 
her quietest hours — hours of bodily rest and mental peace — 
were those she passed among the rose and amber aureoles 
of the lamps, while the day died a mysterious death across 
the rain-soaked reaches of the Park. 

Beyond touch of her hand, and beyond the reach of her 
loving lips, the child lay in a nest of soft laces and silken 
ribbons, asleep. His swinging cradle of satinwood and in- 
lay of tinted pearl was always placed a certain distance 
from her chair; near enough for worship and adoration, 
yet just too far for the gay tenderness, the chirping of 
pursed lips, the fondling of white hands, and all the thou- 
sand sweet familiarities which are the visible signs of a 
heart-hidden mother love. 

To Mary, such a sacrifice of desire and instinct could 
never cease to be an agony, but she bore it, with the same 
outwardly calm conviction of her position towards the in- 
fant which had filled her whole being from that decisive 
moment when she had seen the vision of the Immaculate 
Conception. 

So she sat, one day, warmly embraced by the deep, soft 
cushions of her chair. A book in a sombre binding lay 


238 


WITHOUT SIN 


face downwards on her knees. It told of the lives and 
deaths of those sainted women whose martyrdom has earned 
for them eternal life in the memory of the world. She 
loved to read of them, for though every fibre of her own 
being revolted stubbornly against the faith for which they 
suffered, the recital in quaint, rude language of their 
agonies helped her through mere sympathy to bear her 
own. 

But now for {he moment she was not reading. Her 
slender fingers, small and pointed, were laced across the 
open volume, and her eyes, large and dark with the pas- 
sion of maternity, were bent on her baby, who, with his 
pale yellow curls tossed above his low round forehead, and 
his wee fists clenching the rare lace on his coverlet, slept 
like a rosy angel on a sun-kissed cloudlet. 

And as she looked a great wave of unsatisfied love 
throbbed up from her heart, and drove a sudden mist of 
scorching tears to her eyes. A sob, born of an overwhelm- 
ing self-pity, caught her by the throat, and sent the blood 
surging in her ears. 

But the weakness of the mortal passed, driven back to 
its source by her indomitable faith in the immortal. As 
she brushed the tears from her lashes, she found that Dr. 
Marrable stood before her. She rose at once to greet him, 
letting her book slip unheeded to the ground. 

“I did not hear you announced, ’’ she said in tones which 
all her self-command could not steady. ‘‘I was ” 

“Dreaming over the fire? Besides, all your carpets are 
so thick, that one can walk like a cat in your house, re- 
plied Marrable, following her to the glowing environment 
of the hearth, and taking the low chair, which by the acci- 
dent of habit he generally occupied. He looked at her a 
little anxiously as she sank once more among her cushions; 
he had caught the echo of that smothered sob as he had 


WITHOUT SIN 


239 


entered, and even now a shed tear shimmered like a dia- 
mond on the band of soft white fur which crossed her breast. 
An impulse to console, to sympathise, seized him, but he 
put it from him. 

He affected not to notice her condition, and with his usual 
cold professionalism crushing down the last traces of her 
emotion and his own involuntary sympathy, he proceeded 
to inquire after her health. 

Half-a-dozen questions and answers exhausted the sub- 
ject, and then he rose and walked over to the cot. 

‘HIow the child grows! There is no need to ask if he 
is well.” 

He bent his stern, cold face down over the sleeping child 
until his lips, set in a hard line, almost brushed the tossed 
doss-like curls. With one finger he stroked the baby fist, 
which in sleepy unconsciousness unclosed and stretched to 
its full dimpled size, then shut tenaciously round the dis- 
turbing element. 

At that sweet contact, so warmly velvety, so weakly 
strong, the whole ice of Marrable’s face broke up, and 
Mary, watching from her chair, saw the red blood rise and 
ebb beneath the swarthy skin, and smiles — real, invol- 
untary — flow from both mouth and eyes. 

You too, see that he grows?” she cried, a happy ring 
dominating the last faint trembling in her voice. 

Marrable raised his head from above the child’s face 
and looked aci'oss at Mary sitting in the golden firelight. 

“ He grows stronger and more beautiful every day. He 
is so like you.” 

The compliment — if indeed it were meant for one — fell 
almost reluctantly from him, but both it and its method of 
delivery were lost upon her. She only heard that her son 
was well and strong and beautiful. That he should carry 
her stamp upon his features seemed only natural ; for how 


240 


WITHOUT SIN 


could he bear a likeness which man could presume to trace 
to that great Entity whom man had never seen? 

Then she drifted back to her old dreams once more, and 
Marrable, gently and reluctantly forcing his finger from 
that persistent clinging clasp, came again to his low seat 
by the fire. But all the quiet familiarity of his surround- 
ings, the pure-faced, silent woman, the soft, regular breath- 
ing of the little child, failed to still the tumult which the 
frail touch of her baby’s fingers had stirred in blood and 
brain. 

His keen eyes shifted from the infant’s cot to its mother’s 
chair. To and fro, without a movement of his dark, griz- 
zled head, his glance travelled — only it always rested longer 
on the snow-hued velvet gown and fair, golden head of 
Mary and left them more slowly for the cot. 

Twice his tongue stirred to break the silence, but old 
habits of restraint held him in an iron grip that even love 
was powerless to relax. At the bare notion of speaking 
love words, a grim smile grew at the corners of his mouth. 
What could he plead but his loneliness and Mary’s invidious 
condition as reasons for marriage? 

The word formed involuntarily in his mind. His whole 
brain reeled at the idea. His spirit— independent and 
entirely unused to bow to wishes and opinions other than 
his own — had for years revolted at the thought of submis- 
sion to a mere whimsical woman. 

And the momentary silence had grown to a quarter of an 
hour, and still he could not speak. Man of the world 
though he was, the very intensity of his longing stayed 
his tongue. 

The clock — a Louis XV. toy with a swinging pendulum 
of enamel and brilliants — chimed four. Then Noel Mar- 
rable cleared his throat and spoke. 

“Only four o’clock. How the days are drawing out. 


WITHOUT SIN 


241 


Though ill here your fire and lamps point at midwinter. Is 
not Lady St. Cyprien coming to-day?” 

“ No!” said Mary in dreamy tones. “ She has taken Lord 
St. Cyprien to Brighton for a few days. He had not been 
well.” 

“And Lady Theo?” 

“ I do not expect Lady Theo. She is a little vexed with 
me, I think, just now. She wishes so much to found a sect 
at once; to make a cult of — of the child. She has not the 
patience to wait until such time as he himself can teach us 
what is right for us to know.” 

The fervent faith and quiet certainty of her words, uttered 
with the assurance of true belief, jarred unaccountably on 
Marrable’s nerves. He turned abruptly as she spoke, and 
cut across her speech almost before it had left her mouth. 

“ Your life must be sadly solitary just now.” 

The words were sympathetic, but the tone was harsh and 
rough, as though he wished to force her thoughts from the 
intangible future, to the present — and to her own per- 
sonality. 

“ Socially perhaps I am a little lonely — but — some 
day ” 

Again Marrable stayed her from drifting back to her 
faith in the future, her content with the present. 

“ But has it never struck you that there are other lives to 
consider; the happiness of others to confirm, beside your 
own — and the child’s?” 

“ The little one will bring happiness to all the world — 
some day,” she answered, with her shining eyes fixed on 
her baby’s face. 

“ But meanwhile— until then?” cried Marrable. “ What 
will you do with yourself and your life until then?” 

She shifted her calm, passionless eyes from the cradle to 
his face. 

16 


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“I can wait!” she said simply, yet with a whole world 
of patience and abnegation in the three small words. 

Marrable rose from his chair and, passing before the fire, 
came over to where she sat. Her hand, white as milk and 
smooth as satin, gleamed from among the deep hues of her 
silken cushions like carven ivory. He bent down and took 
the slender fingers in his own strong palm. 

“ Mary, will you marry me?” 

Across his face, lowered so closely to her own, the per- 
fume of her hair was wafted. His words were spoken 
almost in her ear, his hand clasped hers. Both his speech 
and manner were calm to coldness, but within, his heart 
was alive with the flame of love. 

And Mary — whom neither the passion of Eugene Cohen 
nor the chivalry of Lord Stansdale had stirred from her 
virginal iciness — endured at this man’s touch, at this man’s 
proposal, one grand thrill of desire. For one brief moment 
all the womanhood in her young body and blood cried aloud 
for a mate. 

The sensation shocked her. A vague horror of herself, 
an undefined fear of the man who could so move her nature, 
filled her, and with the white chasing the red from her 
shamed cheeks, she drew herself away from all contact with 
her wooer. 

“ Be my wife, Mary ; let my true love protect you from 
the world’s cruel sneers.” 

His sensitive fingers had felt and read that overwhelm- 
ing thrill of sex, and now he put forth his arms and 
tried to clasp her to him, but she, with every instinct 
aroused by fear, slipped past him, and, running to the cot, 
fenced herself behind the frail body of her baby son. 

The involuntary act was the very triumph of her belief 
in the divine power of her offspring to protect his mother, 
and Marrable could but yield before such a manifestation 


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243 


of faith. He did not attempt to follow her, for to do so 
would have been an insult, but with the cot and with the 
‘child between them, so near together and yet divided by 
the faith of a whole people, Marrable pleaded with Mary. 

Instinct warned him to make but few protestations of 
love, but respect, faithfulness and protection he dared and 
did offer her. He even pointed out to her the loneliness 
of her life, and the ostracism of herself; almost he would 
have spoken of the stain upon her name; but that man- 
hood and her own innocence fettered his tongue. 

“ Do not ask — do not urge — ” was all her answer. “ You 
have been my friend. I have so few friends now, as you 
yourself tell me; do not lose me one of them. Let me still 
go to you in trouble or sickness ; do not rob me of yourself.” 

Sure of herself once more, she stretched out one hand 
above the crowing babe, and laid it lightly on his arm. 

“My friend, I shall never marry!” 

Her face, with its soft, dovelike eyes, and tender, child- 
ish mouth, was filled with the strength of her purpose, and 
he felt that to fight further was useless. Yet there was 
one thing more he could net help saying; 

“ But have you fully considered the difficulties of bring- 
ing up the child? A boy requires a father’s guidance.” 

Swiftly her fingers fluttered from his arm and were laid 
across his mouth, which had dared so to blaspheme. 

“ Hush!” she said, in an awe-stricken whisper. “Hush! 
The father will surely look after his child.” 

Marrable turned away abruptly, and taking up his hat, 
walked silently towards the door. 

With it open in his hand he looked once more towards 
Mary and her son. 

Already she seemed to have forgotten his presence. With 
her hands held above her heart, she stood in an attitude of 
reverential adoration before the cradle. Shoulder high and 


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close behind her hung the Madonna’s picture, lit by a, small 
lamp. In pose, in colour, in expression, the similitude 
was marvellous, and to Marrable the one saintly face 
seemed as unearthly as the other. 

She was right j no woman with such a face and such a 
faith should marry. 

“One word more!” Marrable spoke from the doorway. 
“Forget what has passed, and forgive me. Let us always 
be friends. Only make me one promise. Should you ever 
want aid, will you send for me?” 

She bowed her head in mute assent, and he left, closing 
the door quietly behind him, on her and on his love. 


CHAPTER XXVIII 


Mary’s first instinct with regard to Noel Marrable’s offer 
of marriage was to write the circumstances to Lady St. 
Cyprien, from whom now, in her loneliness, she had no 
secrets. But even as she sat, pen in hand, and laid against 
the paper to trace the first words, she hesitated. A faint 
reflex of the passionate awakening of the flesh which his 
touch had aroused in her, sent the hot blood to her cheeks, 
and bowed her head in maidenly shame. The pen dropped 
from her fingers, and she pushed the paper from her. 

“Perhaps, one day, when we are alone, I will tell her,” 
she thought, turning from the writing-table. 

But what is hard to write is harder still to speak, and 
neither Lady St. Cyprien nor any one else ever knew that 
Marrable had proposed and Mary refused. Meanwhile, 
the year grew through spring to summer, and the child 
grew with it. As the days lengthened and became warmer, 
Mary resumed the ordinary habits of her life, though society 
knew her no more. She was, however, seen in the Row in 
the morning, and driving every afternoon, and people said 
she was lovelier than ever. 

A few who craved for reflected notoriety tried to know 
her; but she did not choose to be so known. Her feminin- 
ity and natural reserve took fright at once at the first at- 
tempts to lionise her, and she refused invitations to every 
house where she apprehended being stared at or treated as 
a celebrity. Mr. Bertie Chant’s essay to interview her for 
a new church and stage journal ended in failure, and a 


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half-mad, wholly blackmailing Kabbi who offered to preach 
a crusade about the new redeemer — for a consideration — 
was removed from her house by her servants. 

Mrs. Mossenthal, with her long thin nose always a-quiver 
after notoriety, regularly left cards at Holmhurst once a 
month, and assiduously bowed and nodded to Mary, as they 
passed in the whirl of the West End streets. 

‘^The girlis probably mad,” she would say to herself, 
after such an elaborate display of friendship. “ But sup- 
pose she should turn out to be right after all, how silly 
every one will look who is cutting her now. Besides, ’Sac 
is her relation, and it is my duty not to turn my back on 
her. ” 

But Mrs. Cohen, the “Queen of Bayswater,” refused so 
to trim her sails. She wanted no reflected glory, and no 
divided allegiance among her followers. In her heart she 
still hated Mary for refusing her handsome Eugene, whose 
latest escapade included an actress of extraordinarily ill re- 
pute, and an extravagant and vowdy me )i a f/e up the river. 
So Mrs. Cohen, who, like all her 'sex, loved to find a reason 
for everything, believed that her son’s evil courses were 
caused by Mary’s heartless conduct, and preached open 
war against her accordingly. 

Mary at this time found her chiefest honour at Mr. 
Erastus Bawdon’s flat. His Roman Catholicism was now 
largely tinged with Judaism, and he was forever seeking and 
finding analogies between the two religions. He frequently 
discussed the possibility of converting his new church in 
Berkshire into a Synagogue. In the interval of making 
up his mind on this distracting point, he commenced build- 
ing a small convent, which with its tiny chapel would, 
when completed, enhance and perfect the beauties of the 
church. 

For the fit decoration of this retreat, which was to be 


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247 


dedicated to the Holy Mother, Mary sat to a new artist, 
though not as a maiden with empty folded hands, and eyes 
that wondered what the world might be, but as the Virgin 
Mother, with the fulfilment of maternity glowing in her face, 
and the veil across her bosom clutched by pink baby fingers. 
A statue, too, in purest w^hite marble, was modelled in her 
likeness, for the further beautifying of the little chapel, 
which Erastus Bawdon desired to make a gem among the 
fairest prayer-houses of the world. 

Yet, though at Mr. Bawdon’s rooms the talk often turned 
on the future, and the methods by which the human race 
were to learn of the new faith, and of the birth of a virgin^s 
son, Mary stedfastly drew the line at propagandaism. 

“Neither you, nor I, nor any one can know what the 
true message is,” she would say, with her fervent eyes 
fixed on the little one, who kicked and laughed so glee- 
fully at her feet. “ The world is full enough of false faiths; 
let us not add one more to the number. In good time he 
will speak.” 

As the child grew in intelligence, so Mary fought with 
her love and her instinct. The sacrifice of motherhood was 
daily made, and custom could not rob it of one pang. The 
babe had a beautiful character, loving and sweet. He was 
a child whom the least instinctively mother- woman must 
have adored, and Mary, whose every fibre was enwrapped 
in her son, was the embodiment of worship before him. 

But always at a distance. Even when he held out his 
wee hands to her, and leaped in his longing to be near her; 
even when his fr^h, dewy mouth puckered into a wail of 
disappointment; even when his eyes laughed into hers 
with joy at sight of her, she withstood the temptation to 
clasp him to her breast, to kiss and tickle his white warm 
little body, to toss him in mid-air, and roll him in mimic 
wrath among the downy pillows. 


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Only, sometimes, when she had the baby to herself, she 
would kneel in humble reverence, and clasp the restless, 
rosy feet and pray for future mercy for herself and on the 
world. For the very sweetness of the child’s disposition 
was as a wall between the mother and her son, and every 
smile and coo were as the lashes of a torturing whip upon 
her naked heart. 

It was late autumn before Mary met Dr. Marrable again. 
Design on his hand had kept them apart, but on Mary’s 
side it had been merely chance. Her life was too intensely 
strained towards the future, too painful in the present, to 
retain more than a shadowy memory of the past, and ex- 
cept that now and then she heard his name from Lady St. 
Cyprien or Lady Theo Bellastier, she might almost have 
forgotten his existence. 

It was in Bond Street that they met. The winter’s day 
had died in the arms of evening, and Mary, crossing the 
pavement quickly from a brilliantly lit shop to her carriage, 
ran right into the arms of an advancing figure. 

Mutual apologies revealed their identities. 

“ I have not seen you for an age. How have you been?” 
asked Marrable, standing between Mary and the carriage. 

“Very well indeed.” 

“And the little one — the boy; is he well?” 

A grave reproach filled her eyes, and drew her mouth into 
a sweetly stern expression. 

“ Well? How can you ask? How can he ail?” 

“ I beg your pardon, ” he said, quite humbly for so proud 
and stiff a man. “I did not remember.” 

Mary drew forth one hand, all warm and scented, from 
her muff, and held it out, a charming peace offering, to Noel 
Marrable. 

“Please don’t apologise. But, indeed, he has never suf- 
fered one moment. Ah! if you knew how worthy he is, in 


WITHOUT SIN 


249 


body and soul, how he bears in every feature a stamp that 
is all immortal. But will you not come and see him one 
day? You will understand then what I mean. I can feel 
in my heart all that he is and will be; but,” she smiled in 
a deprecating fashion, and shook her fair head, “ I never 
could talk cleverly or well. I cannot express to you quite 
what I would say. But do come — come to-morrow. It is 
his birthday.” 

Then she entered her carriage, and was driven down the 
glittering streets of gaily lit shops to the Art Gallery, w^here 
for an hour she discussed business with Martin Baird. 

As she rose to go, she said to Baird : 

“ Who do you think I met on my way here, Martin? Dr. 
Marrable, whom I have not seen for a long time. You 
remember him, of course?” 

Baird looked keenly at his mistress from under his shaggy 
brows. 

“ I know him well, Miss Levinge. He is in here at least 
once a week.” 

“Here!” cried Mary. “ What does Dr. Marrable come 
here for?” 

“ He is quite a china maniac in a small way,” answered 
the old man, with his eyes still fixed on the girl’s face, as she 
bent over the fire. “ He drops in and looks round and bu3's 
something every few days, and always has a chat with me.” 

A question trembled on the tip of Mary’s tongue, a 
question that must have occurred to every woman under 
like circumstances. She blushed at the idea it suggested, 
then blushed again, as her sex and curiosity conquered. 

“ When did Dr. Marrable first take to buying old china, 
Martin?” 

“ About last February ; and when he comes he always 
asks after you — and the child,” said Baird, in his most 
ungracious manner. 


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He had noted the hesitation, and caught sight of the 
burning blush, and it hurt his faithful soul that Mary 
should have kept a heart-secret from so old and true a 
friend as himself. 

No further words passed between mistress and man. 
Mary mused by the fire, as she slowly buttoned her gloves; 
Martin Baird busied himself in putting away in the safe 
the ledgers and letter-books which had been taken out for 
inspection. 

Presently she turned from the fire, and held out a hand 
in farewell. 

“Mind you come to-morrow; it is the child’s birthday; 
besides, Mr. Bawdon wants to speak to you about a Carlo 
Dolci he has been offered. And, Martin, unless you are 
sure of a speedy market, I don’t think we had better have 
that Eaphael from Clydesmere Castle. Eleven thousand 
pounds is a good deal to sink for an indefinite time; and 
some day, it may not be very far off, all the money I can 
find may be wanted to help /n’w.” 

As she drove northwards to the Eegent’s Park, the 
memory of Noel Marrable forced itself upon her. 

“So he does have news of me sometimes,” she mused. 

“ How grey and aged he looked by the lamplight outside 
Eedfern’s.” 


CHAPTER XXIX 


There was to be a little tea-party at Holmhurst. Lady 
St. Cyprien, who had been out of health for some time and 
was on the eve of leaving England for the south, was com- 
ing, and a few mutual friends were expected to bid her 
“ Good-bye.’’ 

Intent on seeing Mary alone, Lady St. Cyprien arrived 
early, only to find she had to wait a while for her hostess. 
As she sat before the fire this dull January afternoon, she 
wondered a little sadly if there would be any gaps in the 
ranks of those she loved when she returned next summer. 

Mr. Erastus Bawdon’s sonorous, oily tones interrupted 
her reverie. He was larger and more overwhelming in 
.presence than ever and more pronouncedly ecclesiastical in 
his garb. But his conversation was eminently worldly, and 
he chattered of theatres and shooting-parties, the latest 
scandal in hunting circles, and the newest liaison of a 
favourite dancer with infinite appreciation. 

By the time he had exhausted his leading themes he gave 
his voice a rest, only inquiring if the Countess had any 
gossip to retail. 

‘‘None of very great general interest. I’m afraid,” said 
Lady St. Cyprien, in her gentle, quiet way. Though St. 
Cyprien and I were very pleased at a little bit of family 
news we heard this morning. Stansdale is going to be 
married.” 

“Really!” exclaimed Mr. Bawdon. “Why, I always 
thought ” And he glanced about him. 


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‘‘That his love for Mary Levinge was incurable. Yes; 
so did we all. Indeed, for a time I think he half hoped to 
win her for his wife. But he now sees the uselessness of 
it; and he is a man who appreciates his future responsi- 
bilities. He knows, too, how much we — St. Cyprien and 
I — long to see the old line firmly re-established before we 
go; and so he is going to marry early in the spring. She 
is a charming girl — Lord Dulverton’s second daughter — 
very bright, and wdll have money when her grandmother 

the Dowager dies. It’s a good match, but— I wish ” 

Lady St. Cyprien finished her sentence with a sigh, which 
changed to a smile as the door was flung wide, and a patter 
of tiny feet and the ring of a baby voice announced Mary 
and her little son. 

The little boy, who was tall and slender for his three 
years, rushed impetuously into Lad}^ St. Cyprien’ s arms, 
with his fleecy, golden curls a-flying and his scarlet mouth 
puckered like a rosebud, for a kiss. 

Mary, who with the child had just returned from her 
drive, and into whose cheeks the keen, damp air had 
whipped a rich colour, until her face glowed like a jewel 
above the setting of her snowy furs, excused her lateness 
on the plea that the fog outside was growing thicker, and 
that her coachman had lost his way. 

It was on the tip of the Countess’s tongue to say that the 
child should not have been out on such a stormy afternoon, 
but the custom of the past few years had taught her to 
maintain silence on the question of the little one’s well- 
being. 

“In the corner behind the screen are some toys,” she said 
lovingly to the little boy. 

Mary busied herself in removing the child’s thick white 
coat and soft fur cap. She touched him very gently, yet 
always with an air of restraint and humility which had 


WITHOUT SIN 


253 


now become liabitnal with her in her relations with her 
child. 

‘‘ Is he not beautiful?” she said in low tones to Mr. 
Bawdon, as the baby, shaking himself free from her tender 
clasp, trotted away in search of the new toys. 

“His beauty is not of this world,” murmured Erastus 
Bawdon, in his most clerical manner. “It is godlike.” 

Mary quivered and smiled in one breath. Words such as 
these were mingled gall and honey to her. At once they 
emphasised the difference which lay between herself and 
her son, and confirmed her own great faith in him. She 
clasped her hands almost convulsively as she whispered 
back : 

“Yes, you are right; he is godlike!” 

And then she permitted herself to taste her one drop of 
maternal pleasure. She sat and watched her baby as he 
played before the fire at Lady St. Cyprien’s feet. His 
new treasure was a train, with a fine large engine and a 
long string of carriages, all of gaily painted tin. His 
delicate hands, long and narrow like his mother’s, and with 
the same curved finger-tips, his graceful body and his 
tongue just learning to express intelligent joy or sorrow, 
were never still for one second. Fair and fragile as he 
looked, there seemed an everlasting fund of vitality and 
energy in the little form and budding brain. 

And as the mother watched, she saw from beneath her 
lowered lids, as in a beatific vision, her child still fair and 
slender and crowned with the pale halo of his amber curls, 
standing as a preacher amid crowds of disciples, marching 
at the head of vast armies of reclaimed souls, a divine ruler 
in that great city which would rise at his command and be 
the capital of her people’s new kingdom. Then would her 
son, and the son of one greater than she, stoop from his 
throne, and take her by the hand and show her to all the 


254 


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world as that chosen one from whom the world’s redemption 
had sprung. 

“Mary, Mary, my dear!” whispered Lady St. Cyprien. 
“ There is something I want to tell you. Some one may 
■come in presently and mention it, and I think you would 
rather hear it from me.” 

Mary roused herself from her reverie and went over to 
the couch, while Mr. Bawdon struggled down on to his 
knees beside the child, and asked to be initiated into the 
mysteries of “ trains.” 

“Sit down, dear,” said Lady St. Cyprien, possessing her- 
self of one of Mary’s hands as the girl sank on to a low 
stool. “ I want to tell you that Stansdale is going to be 
married. You know where our wishes have lain in the 
past, but ?” 

The Countess paused; for the moment her usual mnr/ 
fro id deserted her, and she sought in vain for a few kindly 
words to complete her sentence. 

The child shouted merrily to her from the rug, and she 
smiled back at him. 

Mary smiled too, and pressed Lady St. C 3 ^prien’s fingers 
in her own. 

“ It was not to be, dear friend. But I am so glad Lord 
Stansdale is going to many. I hope he will have a good 
wife; he deserves one. Will you tell him from me that 1 
congratulate him, and wish him every happiness from the 
bottom of my heart?” 

When tea was brought Mr. Bawdon rose, red and hot, 
from his knees, handed the cups, and turned the conversa- 
tion to the little convent near his church, which was com- 
pleted, and was shortly to be occupied. From the convent 
to church music and ecclesiastical art the chat drifted on, 
rising and falling like a tossed ball in the warm luxury of 
the drawing-room, while the child played quietly on the floor. 


WITHOUT SIN 


255 


So the friends might have talked for hours, but that the 
entrance of Dr. Marrable broke up the circle, and brought 
a whiff of the dank air of the winter evening into the 
room. 

‘‘Ah, do not let me drive you away,^’ he cried, as Mr. 
Bawdon rose from his chair. 

He held out a big strong hand to Mary’s son, who, 
wearied by play, sat among the wreckage of the brightly 
coloured train. The little one, with sweet confidence, 
slipped his baby palm into Marrable’ s. 

“Miss Levinge,” he said, as he clasped the tiny fingers. 
“ Your room is too hot. This little hand is like a coal.” 

“ He has been playing before the fire for some time. He 
is quite well,” cried Mary quickly, moving her chair back 
from the blaze, and drawing the child towards her till he 
leaned against her knee. Marrable took his tea and sipped 
it almost in silence. His presence seemed to have cast a 
chill upon the party. Grim and stern, he sat upright in 
his chair, forcing a remark from his lips now and then. 

“Tired, Noel?” asked Lady St. Cyprien presently, more 
to break the silence which was growing oppressive than for 
any wish for an answer. 

“ Yes, I am rather,” he said. “I’ve not been to bed for 
three nights, and though I’m pretty strong, there were cir- 
cumstances connected with the case, which ” 

He set down his cup and left the sentence unfinished. 

“Was it a very bad case?” said Mary gently. 

“ It was inflammation — a — little child — the only one. It 
died this morning at seven.” 

The words dropped from his set mouth abruptly, and 
his face turned grey in the sparkling firelight. 

“The little child is at peace,” said Mary very quietly. 
“ But the mother — the poor broken-hearted mother — how 
terrible for her!” 


256 


WITHOUT SIN 


There was an intense pity in her voice, but the faint 
smile which curved her mouth was the smile of perfect 
happiness. At least, if the common joys of motherhood 
were denied her, the commoner sorrows of sickness and of 
death might not come near her. 

Still with the smile on her face, she turned moist eyes of 
sincerest sympathy on Marrable. The strange attraction 
that sometimes lies between two people drew his eyes 
towards her at the same moment. 

In another second he was leaning forward in his chair, 
one hand stretched down to the child who had, as though 
tired out, slipped to the floor 'at Mary’s feet, and pillowed 
his head in the folds of her gown. 

‘‘ I do not think — I am afraid — that your little boy 

^‘i^onsense Marrable,” cried Mr. Bawdon in reproving 
tones. You are tired and have got sick children on the 
brain. ” 

“He’s a little flushed and sleepy, that’s all,” said Lady 
St. Cyprien from her arm-chair. “ Mary, dearest, I hate to 
lose him, but the wee one is so worn out it would be only 
kind to send him to bed. ” 

The smile of faith was on Mary’s mouth, though the 
mother-love and mother-fear had dilated her eyes, as she 
stooped to raise the curled-up form nestling so warmly 
against her feet. 

The child wailed fretfully as she touched him. 

“Allow me!” 

Marrable had been quicker than she, and now held the 
drowsy baby in his arms. 

For one swift second the instinct of maternity had Mary 
at its mercy and her eager mouth brushed across the little 
hot face. But she drew back before the kiss was complete, 
and the great faith that was in her quelled the anguish in 
her widened eyes. 


WITHOUT SIN 


257 


“Wants to go to bed, I’se tired,” murmured the child, 
twisting restlessly in Marrable’s arms. 

“I will carry him upstairs,” said Marrable. 

In the hall he faced Mary, still with the baby in his 
arms. 

“ Miss Levinge, the child is very feverish. I fear he has 
contracted a severe chill.” 

Mary caught her breath, but her face was set and her 
voice steady. 

“ I think not. Dr. Marrable. The drawing-room is very 
hot, that is all. Why, you might as well say that I am 
feverish.” 

She laid one burning hand, which, despite her self-con- 
trol, shook like a leaf, on his cool fingers. 

“I am sorry I cannot agree with you. Miss Levinge,” 
answered Marrable curtly, moving towards the staircase. 

As he gave up the little one at the nursery door, he spoke 
again, almost entreatingly. 

“ If he becomes worse, promise me you will send for me.” 

In the light that gleamed from the open door he saw her 
look at him. A supreme pity for his lack of faith, and a 
boundless belief, shone in her eyes. 

“ You are very kind. Dr. Marrable, but you do not under- 
stand. All will be well with the child.” 

17 


CHAPTER XXX 


“All will be well with the child!” 

Mary’s simple words seemed prophetic, for. when the next 
morning her little son came into her room he looked almost 
as fresh and sweet as the bunch of white violets he brought 
her as an offering. Only the merest shadow beneath his 
blue eyes gave faint evidence of the feverish attack of the 
previous day. 

“Muvva,” he cried, lifting himself on tiptoe and laying 
his perfumed present on Mary’s pillow, “ Here’s some pitty 
flowers for ’oo.” He looked gravely at her as she lay, fair 
and white among the rich laces of her bed. 

Mary lifted one of her son’s wee hands and kissed the 
rosy little fingers reverently. 

“You are well to-day, my child?” she asked. 

“Es! I fink so. May I go a ride vis morning?” 

Mary rose, and, drawing a dressing-gown round her, 
went to the window. Autumn mists were hanging among 
the trees, but a pale sun was already fighting for a glimpse 
of earth, and the day promised fair. 

“In an hour, dear, you may go. See, let us ring and 
order White Rose for ten o’clock.” 

The child listened while his mother gave the order for 
his donkey to be saddled, then, as she crossed to the fire to 
sip her chocolate in the circle of its warmth before dressing, 
he came to her side and chatted his bright baby talk till she 
laughed. 

And when he left her to be dressed for his ride, she 


WITHOUT SIN 


259 


smiled again at the recollection of Lady St. Cyprien’s 
foolish fears and Marrable’s prognostication of illness. 

Household duties — for in those quiet times she was much 
among her women — her drive, and business with Baird at 
the Art Gallery occupied her day until the wintry dusk had 
fallen and a bitter wind cut fiercely down the wider streets. 
As she stepped from her carriage into the white warmth of 
the splendid house, a thrill of physical pleasure in the 
beauty and comfort and perfumed luxury of her surround- 
ings passed through her. 

“How happy — how blest I am!” 

The words left her lips involuntarily as she began to 
mount the wide stairs towards her own room. 

“ If you please, ma’am, Nurse would like you to go to the 
nursery.” 

Her own maid. Carter, met her at her bedroom door with 
the message, and, though Mary did not notice the circum- 
stance, did not even offer to delay her by removing her 
outer wraps. 

With the costly white velvet and heavy fur of her pelisse 
still clasped about her, Mary mounted the next flight of 
stairs and ran with swift feet to the nursery. 

At the doorway she paused, reproaching herself for such 
unnecessary haste, and as angry as her gentle nature could 
be with the fanciful and over-anxious servant. 

With a smile on her lips, though her breath still came 
fast from her run, she opened the door and went in. 

The nursery was a large room, lit by three windows, 
which, in summer-time, gave charming views across the 
lawns and tree-tops. Now they were curtained close with 
warm draperies of white stuff, on which loving fingers had 
worked in gay wools a thousand quaint images drawn from 
children’s lore. 

A swinging lamp made a bright circle over the table, now 


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spread for tea, but the room was not so light that a large 
lire dancing behind the high guard did not fling merry rays 
and leaping shadows into the further end, where stood the 
nurse’s bed and the little white and silver cot of the child. 
A wardrobe and a cupboard sacred to toys, flanked the 
bright fire, before which was Mary’s favourite low seat, and 
the fanciful little basket chair given the child on his last 
birthday. The two chests of drawers and the wash-hand- 
stand and toilet table stood in a small dressing-room lead- 
ing from the nursery, where also burned a cheerful fire. 
Pictures — principally of animals — adorned the walls, and a 
tall clock that chimed at each quarter, stood between two 
of the windows. 

The room was delightfully warm, bright, and comfortable, 
yet even as she set her foot upon the threshold, the instinct 
of the mother warned Mary that all was not well. 

What is the matter? Why do you send for me?” she 
said quickly, closing the door behind her and advancing into 
the room. 

Between the tea-table and the bright, high guard of steel, 
was a great strew of toys— a sure sign in a well-ordered 
nursery of discontent or illness. Noah’s animals were 
jumbled with the wreckage of a ship and the scattered build- 
ings of a farmstead; wooden bricks and letter blocks, 
picture puzzles and railway cars, were direfully commingled. 
A broken drum and battered trumpet reposed amid the 
ruins of a camp and the remnants of a leaden army. A 
mechanical bear lay on its side, still moving its legs and 
head slowly. A hundred picture-books, in every state of 
dismemberment, lay like wind-blown leaves, and the scrap- 
book’s back was broken past repair. 

The child sat in his own little basket chair. The bril- 
liant cretonne-covered cushion which belonged to it was 
pulled up behind his head. His cheeks were like scarlet 


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261 


peonies, and his eyes like stars — glowing from behind a 
veil of mist. His tiny hands were plucking idly at the ring 
of stiff black hair that toy-makers by tradition ascribe to 
Japanese dolls. 

“ Why, my child, all your toys out, and thrown aside? 
Are you so tired of them?” said Mary, forcing a smile to 
her lips. 

The child looked at her, then, without speaking, turned 
his attention again to the doll’s head. 

“ I think he is ill, ma’am!” interposed the nurse. “He 
enjoyed his ride this morning, but would not eat his dinner, 
and this afternoon nothing has suited him. He won’t touch 
his tea, and he’s so cross that I ” 

Mary stopped the flow of words with a gesture, while 
her straight brows drew together in displeasure. 

“The child ill! The child cross!” How could such 
words be said to her? 

She pulled the glove from her right hand, and laid it, still 
cold from the outer air, tentatively, and as though she were 
committing a liberty, against the child’s hot face. 

“Oh! how lovely. You is so cold — and I’se so hot — so 
hot.” 

With little palms that scorched like living flames, he 
drew her slim Angers across his burning mouth, and 
mumbled them as though he would draw coolness from 
them. 

Mary knelt by her son and yielded both her hands to his 
hot, clinging clasp. She spoke to the nurse over her 
shoulder. 

“ The child is over-heated. How high is the thermometer 
here? Over seventy? I thought so. Open the door at 
once and take some of that fire off. Light candles and 
lower the gas. This room is far too warm.” 

Presently the child grew cooler and drowsed in his chair, 


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with his mother still kneeling by his side and holding the 
gentle coolness of her palms on his baby face. 

Outwardly she was quite calm, for the nameless fear of 
yesterday had not come to her again, but in ics place was 
an overwhelming sensation of annoyance — against whom? 

Was she vexed with Lady St. Cyi)rien, who had said the 
child was over-tired? Was she angry with Dr. Marrable, 
who had foretold with such insistance a prospective illness? 
Or was she merely annoyed at the foolish whims of a fussy, 
ignorant domestic? 

She did not know. Only her -usually meek spirit was 
roused to revolt against these unbelievers, who would not 
grasp the truth before them ; these scoffers, whose eyes and 
ears were blind and deaf to all they did not choose to 
understand. 

Of her own humanity she doubted not. She was the 
offspring of a man and of a woman, and must suffer in the 
flesh and perish as all such offsprings do. But her son 
was not such as these. His coming was a miracle; his 
invulnerability and infallibility were certain. And she had 
proof if she had desired it, for during the brief years he 
had lived on earth among the people he had been born to 
redeem and save, no common pang of childhood had come 
to him. His health had been as perfect as his body. 

And so Mary, with her scorn of poor mortals over-riding 
for once her gentleness, soothed her child into a doze, and 
then turned triumphantly to the nurse. 

“ You see, now that the room is cooler, baby is perfectly 
well, the fever has quite left him. Put him to bed now, 
he will be asleep in a moment.” 

She rose to her feet and brushed her fingers once more 
across the child’s forehead. 

“He is quite well; quite well!” 

Mary spent the evening in praying at her white altar for 


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263 


forgiveness of her heart-sin. How could she expect the 
people of the world — even those who knew the truth — to 
yet awaken from the sleep of indifference, selfishness, and 
unbelief, which had enwrapt them for all ages? It was not 
for her to chide or to preach. He who was promised in a 
vision, and made manifest by a miracle, would rouse the 
souls of men and warm their hearts of stone in his own 
good time. And with repentance in her heart and hope for 
the future in her eyes, Mary lay down to rest, after thank- 
ing God for His mercy to herself and to her people. 

She never knew how long she had slept, when the touch 
of a hand on her arm, the flare of a light in her eyes, and 
a frightened voice crying incoherently in her ear, woke her 
with a violent start. 

“Ma’am, come at once! Baby is very ill! Come to 
him!” 

Mary leapt from the bed. Pushing the tangles of her 
hair from her sleep-laden eyes, she stared about her. The 
rose-shaded night lamp showed her that she was alone, but 
the open door and the sound of footsteps in rapid retreat, 
forbade the hope that voice' and touch had been a dream. 

Dashing a little water across her face and catching up a 
wrapper, Mary sped towards the nursery. 

But as she neared it, she paused; her feet, her very 
breath stilled by a monotonous sound of a low ceaseless 
moan. Inarticulate as the cry of a dumb animal, it struck 
her with an awful sense of fear and impotence. Surely it 
was mortal pain and suffering that found voice in such a 
wail. 

With her knees trembling under her, and her heart 
thumping against her side, Mary staggered, rather than 
walked into the nursery. 

“Oh, ma’am, thank heaven you’ve come. The poor 
lamb! See how he suffers!” 


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Mary put the weeping woman aside with a very gentle 
touch and walked to the child’ s cot. 

During one moment that seemed an eternity of suffering, 
the whole edifice of her faith was shaken. She clutched 
the silver cot rail, as though body and soul were tottering 
to their everlasting fall. 

Lying amid the tossed bed-clothes, the rare beauty of his 
face marred by a deep flush, and his eyes, twin lakes of 
blue, upturned beneath the puffed eyelids, lay her child. 

With untiring restlessness, his head turned from side to 
side on the pillow, and always that helpless moan broke in 
gusts from the hot mouth. 

Dor a moment his mother’s presence seemed to soothe 
him, a startled stare of recognition crept into the uncon- 
scious eyes, and there came a pause in the ceaseless mutter. 
Mary checked the cry to heaven for help that rose to her 
own dry lips. 

The swift passing of time that stayed the flow of the 
delirious words, and gave the child over once more to the 
awful clutches of the ravaging brain fever, restored to Mary 
her strength and steadfast faith. 

Like balm the flood of her whole life’s beautiful ideal 
swept across her trembling heart. A divine confidence 
shone in purest radiance from her eyes, which still rained 
tears of love and motherhood; the pitiful smile of one who 
will not be denied peace curved the corner’ s of her sad mouth. 

Slie turned very quietly to the excited nurse. 

“You did well to call me; but there is nothing to fear. 
The child has a feverish cold, and talks in his sleep. 
Give me a chair, please. Since you are afraid, I will stay 
here and watch with you.” 

And as she took the seat offered her, there came the sound 
of baby prattle from the bed, which said pathetically, oh ! 
so pathetically : 


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265 


“Kiss me, and say good-bye.’’ 

She leaned over the rail of the cot and placed her cold 
white cheek against the burning face of her cihld. 

“ I’se going for a long ride, such a long ride. Kiss me 
and say good-bye.” 

From the other end of the room came the sobs of the 
nurse, and Mary had not the heart to reprove her. 


CHAPTER XXXI 


“The little boy is very ill, sir. Nurse said he was awful 
bad last night , and my mistress ordered her out of the nur- 
sery for saying so. My mistress is up there now. Will 
you like to go up, sir, or shall I say ?” 

“ You need not trouble. I will go upstairs. I know the 
way.’’ 

Dr. Marrable strode from the chill outer darkness of the 
winter evening into the warm luxury of the hall at Holm- 
hurst, where the carven oak panel, touched with light lines 
of dead gold, were draped with priceless tapestries, where 
the tread of feet across the floor of white marbles was 
deadened with soft-hued Eastern rugs. He gave his hat 
and coat to the servant, and then with more than usual 
deliberation started to mount the low, wide stairs. 

A marble nymph, with perfectly modelled form and 
taper beckoning finger, laughed and leered at the head of 
the first flight, but her fascinations were without avail, 
even though the glow of pink-shaded lamps turned her 
snow-cold charms to the palpitating semblance of the fairest 
flesh and blood. 

Slower and slower lagged his heavy footsteps, and the 
servant wlio stood below watching him, thought “ the doctor 
must have had a mortal hard day’s work, to be so tired.” 

But once the turn in the stairs hid him from prying eyes, 
Marrable ran like a boy to the second floor and hurried on 
stealthy light feet down the long corridor to the heavily 
curtained doorway, behind which he knew the nurseries lay. 


WITHOUT SIN 


267 


Within, a frail little body was fighting the great battle 
of life and death, and a woman, with eyes that ached to 
weep, and a heart that fainted as the weary hours went by, 
was fighting too — the awful fight of faith and fear. 

For Mary, despite her grand belief in her God, her child, 
and herself, was racked with all the terrors and anxieties 
which are the entail of maternity. Every twist of the tiny 
tortured limbs, every movement on the pillows of the crim- 
soned baby face, every wail from the fever-parched mouth, 
wrung a responsive cry of pain from her lips, while cruel 
doubts and mad desires to question truth, hammered at her 
heait’s citadel of faith. 

For forty -eight hours she had watched by the side of her 
child’s crib, and twenty-four of them she had passed alone 
with him. For when the frightened nurse had begged for 
medical aid, Mary had thrust her from the room, and kept 
her vigil alone. 

From that supreme moment, when Mary had vowed her- 
self the mother of her child in little more than name, and 
had forced a distant adoration to suffice her for all outward 
manifestations of maternal affection, she had suffered as 
only mothers can, and endured as only martyrs could. But 
her sense of certainty and security in the strange position 
she had taken up, helped her to stand as she had done for 
three years, a humble worshipper, a meek and willing slave, 
at the foot of the throne of the redeemer and savior of her 
people. 

Her calm and steadfast temperament, which lacked the 
wavering weaknesses and wind-tossed fancies of her sex, 
aided her in her great resolve of abnegation and humility, 
while every deadened desire for the soft touch of her baby’s 
lips, the sweet clinging of his dimpled hands, only went to 
feed the fires of her immutable faith. 

But now this sudden illness of her life’s idol had strained 


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her self-control and her powers of belief to cracking point. 
That the child might die did not occur to her, even in her 
moments of deepest fear and grief ; but that he suffered as 
other poor mortals suffer, was sufficient trial to her. 

Yet she would do nothing. Above the mother’s love for 
the child of her body towered the soul’s worship of the 
spirit. To seek for human aid would be to outrage a power 
mightier than her own belief. She did not, dared not, even 
pray for her son’s welfare, for to do so would imply a stain 
upon herself, the chosen instrument of a divine clemency, 
and would cast the shameful shadow of weak doubt upon 
the radiant glory of the beautiful future. So she had passed 
the hours in watching and in suffering, moving from her 
knees only to give the unconscious child a few drops of 
milk, or to smooth the tumbled pillows beneath the tossed 
yellow curls of the ever-restless little head. 

Marrable found her so, as he parted the curtains and 
quietly opened tke door. The child was moaning heavily, 
her ears were throbbing responsive to the ceaseless cry, and 
the slow hot tears were dropping one by one on her clasped 
hands. She did not hear him enter, nor did she note his 
presence till he emerged from the shadows into the ring of 
amber light which fell from the lamp in the centre of the 
room. 

As though his coming portended some new evil, she 
started to her feet, as a frightened hind leaps from the brake. 
Her eyes dilated and grew dark with terror ; her outstretched 
hands beat the air as though to drive him from the room. 

“ Why are you here? What have you come for?” 

She had not spoken for hours, and her voice sounded 
sharp and shrill. 

“Why have you come?” she cried again. 

She left the bedside, and, advancing into the circle of the 
clear light, stood close before him. 


WITHOUT SIN 


269 


Words came not to him at first. His quick run up the 
stairs, the close warmth of the nursery atmosphere, the 
faint, ceaseless moaning from the little bed, and the agony 
of the woman he loved, strangled the voice in his throat. 

He merely looked at her, and with his gaze grew the 
knowledge of a great change — the change which, in a few 
short spaces of time, envoi ves a woman from a girl. 

He saw a slight, loose garment of white silk with wide 
sleeves, swathed and twisted round her slender body with 
so little care that it had parted at the throat, and let a long 
coil of loosened hair curl like a golden snake into the white- 
ness of her bosom. About her face, the pale locks, ruffied 
into an ambient cloud, gleamed in the lamp-light like the 
faint refiex of a glory. 

He saw the cold purity, the exclusive atmosphere of im- 
maculate virginity broken up, shattered for ever by the 
common anguish of all womankind. The sharp, fine lines 
of maidenhood were gone from face and form, lost in the 
fuller amplitude of an anguished maternity that was tor- 
tured with fear, and only able to cry with the shrill, impa- 
tient iteration of nervous suspense : 

“Why have you come?” 

Noel Marrable saw and read as in a book her mother’s 
heart and mother’s fears, her virgin’s soul and mighty 
faith. He saw the awful struggle between the mother- 
hoods of God and man. And as the tragedies of her past, 
her present, and her future were laid bare before him, his 
heart, that had suffered neither mercy nor love for any 
woman, bled for her and for her sex. 

“ The servants sent for me. They said the child was ill, 
and I have come to help you— if I may.” 

He put her aside and walked to the crib, where the 
golden head was still rolling to and fro. 

Mary followed him slowly. Her womanly dignity and 


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self-control left her for a moment, and she cried fretfully, 
like a child who is over-tired : 

111 ! They said the child was ill ! They do not under- 
stand; I cannot get them to believe me that he only has a 
cold — a feverish cold. Any one might get that this weather. 
He is flushed and restless now. Nurse kept the room so hot, 
and then told me that some one should be sent for. But 
it’s not so warm now. I have only kept a small fire all 
day. Of course the evening is always a more feverish 
time; I remember my nurses told me that when I was ill 
myself. ” 

In staccato sentences, broken by short, nervous sobs, she 
rambled on, following aloud an endless train of self-delu- 
sive talk, and finding — poor, hungry soul — a crumb of com- 
fort in that Marrable did not contradict her. 

He did not hear or heed. One glance had revealed to 
him the swift-coming end, one touch of his firm fingers 
upon the scorching skin of the quickly pulsing wrist had 
shot the bolt which struck him to the heart. Every effort 
of his will, every tutored power of self-control were called 
forth to help him bear the truth, and keep silence, for her 
sake. 

Mary laid light fingers on his arm. 

“ I think he’s quieter now. Dr. Marrable. Won’t he fall 
asleep soon?” 

Then he spoke tenderly, soothingly, as though he were 
humoring a fractious child. 

“Yes, yes; he will fall asleep very soon now.” 

Mary was but a woman, and the words of a man with 
the strong pei-sonality of the sex which every instinct of 
the Jewess is bred to acknowledge as her superior, eased 
the tension of her nerves. With a little, hard sob she sank 
once more to her knees. Her first displeasure at his pres- 
ence had yielded to a vague sense of comfort and confidence; 


WITHOUT SIN 


271 


and as she knelt she raised her eyes from time to time from 
her child’s face and let them rest on Marrable’s dark, stern 
features as he sat in the shadow on the other side of the 
silken-curtained crib. 

The hours slipped by in the dim nursery, where, between 
the man and the woman, the little one lay in a torpor, 
which even pain was powerless to disperse. Mary thought 
he slept, but the baby life-fuel was consuming fast in the 
fever’s furnace, and the hoarse moan which broke at in- 
tervals from the swollen mouth grew feebler as the night 
wore on. 

Twice Marrable made up the fire and twice he had laid a 
finger on the fluttering pulse, but Mary watched in silence. 

The big house, with its brightly lit corridors and lofty 
rooms, where the neglected fires died to grey ashes on the 
hearths, was silent as the grave. If the servants watched, 
they did so in their own quarters, to the accompaniment of 
whispered confidences of blame and pity. Outside, the 
night was very still, and twelve booming from the church 
in the Marylebone Koad rolled in resonant waves of clear 
sound over the Park. 

The throbbing of the metal tongue roused the child to a 
fuller consciousness. He drew his tiny pain-racked limbs 
together under the clothes, and began once more the weary 
turning of his head upon the hot pillows. 

V se so f ursty, ” he muttered presently in a thick, hoarse 
voice. Marrable was on his feet at once, and with one arm 
raised the fragile little creature. 

“Quick, some milk at once, and put some brandy in it,” 
he cried imperatively, as Mary, stiff and sore, rose from 
her knees and fetched what he required. 

A few drops were placed between the parched, dry lips, 
and then Marrable motioned the spoon away. 

“ Tank oo, ” the poor, worn mite whispered gratefully, 


272 


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and with a supreme effort lifted his heavy eyelids and 
smiled with his dimmed blue eyes at the two faces — one so 
dark and one so fair — which, cheek against cheek, hung 
over the bed. 

As the brandy quickened the labouring heart and feeble 
pulses, a vague remembrance of some favourite toy stirred 
the aching brain. 

“Where’s my so’jer? My dear ’ickle so’jer,” he cried, 
in a voice which bitter pain and fierce fever had roughened 
and made weak. 

“ What does he want?” murmured Marrable, his eyes 
fixed on the child, intent on catching the sense of the baby 
words. 

“I think he means a soldier,” said Mary bending lower 
over the cot. “ Is it a soldier, my son, one of your toys 
that you want?” 

The child did not answer her directly, but his wasted 
hands wandered like fluttered lily petals over the bed 
clothes, and a hoarse wail broke from his fever-parched 
throat. 

“Fetch it! Find it!” commanded Marrable. 

With tears blinding her sight and falling in scalding 
drops upon her hands, Mary went obediently to the roomy 
cupboard where the toys were kept. Unseeing in her grief, 
she sought for a soldier, and presently took one, all gay 
paint and shining varnish, back to the cot. 

“Here is a soldier, such a fine one.” 

But the sick child turned his heavy eyes away, and cried 
again peevishly. 

Again she sought, groping amid the scores of bright play- 
things. A leaden hussar mounted on a prancing steed and 
waving a pennon, rewarded her search. 

“See, dear!” she cried, hastening to the child, “there 
he is. Shall he talk to you now ?” 


WITHOUT SIN 


m 


She held the toy close to the little one, who, scarcely 
seeing it, weakly lifted one burning hand, and touched it 
with frail, sensitive fingers. 

A fretful cry of disappointment broke from him, and 
Mary, sick with despair at the sound, dropped it on the 
floor, and shook her head in helpless agony. 

“Nannie! Give me my so’jer.” 

Stung by the unconscious appeal to the absent nurse, 
Mary, with bitter t^ars pouring down her white cheeks, 
stumbled once more to the toy-cupboard, and with infinite 
patience, born of an insupportable pain, sought again for 
the little broken toy. 

And if she faltered, even to bursh the hot tears from her 
aching eyes, the fretful voice from the bed, calling ever on 
“ Nannie” to find the soldier, urged her on like a thonged 
whip. 

Far back in the cupboard, amid a whole pile of hastily 
put-away playthings, she found a tiny soldier, battered, 
bereft of all paint, and headless. She sprang to her feet 
and flew across the room. 

“ Here it is at last. Mother has found it. ” 

The child opened his eyes wide, and, stretching out his 
baby fingers, clutched at the treasure quickly. 

That w’as her dearest reward, and she smiled through her 
grief at Marrable across the bed. 

Her son, gazing in her face, smiled too, first following 
the direction of her eyes, and then turning a long look on 
her own face. 

But even as he looked, all the sweet baby love died, 
killed by a throb of pain, and the eyelids drooped once more 
over the dull, blue eyes. 

“Nurse me, nurse me. I’se so tired,” he wailed, as he 
drifted out once more on to the cruel, dark sea of black 
unconsciousness. 

18 


2U 


WITHOUT SIN 


Without one word, Marrable had stood by the bed, 
immovable and cold as stone, save that the blood leaped and 
throbbed through the knotted veins of his clenched hands. 

“Xurse me,” murmured the child, tossing his head upon 
the pillows. 

Still without a word Marrable lifted the little one from 
the crib, and held him towards Mary. 

The love of the mother leapt within her heart, but the 
iron fetters of humility and restrain4 chained her limbs, 
and her arms hung down, flaccid and motionless among the 
crushed folds of her gown. 

“Great God!” cried Marrable, in a voice that rang with 
wonder, “ are you not woman and mother enough to take 
your own child?” 

The fetters were struck off, the barriers were broken 
down, the floodtide of maternity filled her being. With 
an inarticulate cry, Mary caught her son to her breast, and 
with the instinct of the animal who has recovered a lost 
whelp, carried him away to the further end of the room, 
where she hushed him on her breast and wept quietly. 

It was the morning, pallid and yellow with a lowering 
fog, before she spoke again. Then she lifted her face, grey 
and worn with her vigil, and looked across to where Mar- 
rable, the silver in his dark hair shining whitely in the 
circle of the lamp-light, had been sitting through the long 
hours, with one hand over his eyes, thinking the bitter 
thoughts of wasted opportunities and lost loves, which come 
to all mon once in a lifetime. 

Mary hoped he slept, and with her quiet burden crept 
slowly over the floor. He started as she brushed by him, 
and, dropping his hand, raised to her aching eyes a face 
which one weary night of regret had aged by ten years. 
She bent so closely over him, that the child on her breast 
rested also on his heart. 


WITHOUT SIN 


275 


“See!’^ she whispered, “I was right; he was not very 
ill. See how quiet and cool he is. He is quite well.” 

Without answering her, Marrable turned his haggard 
eyes from her face to the still, pale features of the child, 
which looked grey and pinched against the full whiteness 
of her bosom. Silently he rose and followed her to the cot, 
wherein she gently laid the tiny form. 

The little hand, still clutching at the broken toy, was 
laid on the child’s breast. His breath came in long, slow 
cadences that rattled faintly at the end. 

In the supreme faith that her son was resting, Mary put 
him from her, withdrawing her arms slowly from beneath 
him. 

The movement, slight as it was, stirred the last flicker of 
the mortal flame. His lips moved, his eyelids lifted their 
golden fringe from the sunken cheeks. 

He passed one hand very gently over his mother’s white 
face, and when he drew his fingers away, a tear glistened 
on one of them. 

He looked with weak curiosity at the crystal drop, and 
tried to speak, but no sound came; only the glazing eyes 
expressed his childish wish. 

He laid his tear-wet hand against Marrable’ s dry, set 
lips, and, as the man savoured of the bitterness of Mary’s 
sorrow, it filled his whole being, even to his soul. 

Once — twice — from one mouth to the other the tiny 
fingers passed; then, scarcely brushing his mother’s lips, 
they fluttered slowly — gently — down — down — down — till 
they fell, snowflake-light, above the broken tin soldier and 
the still heart. 

Marrable laid the child down, and taking Mary very 
gently by the shoulders, led her a few steps away. With 
all the tenderness of a strong hard man who is softened by 
his pity for the woman he loves, he said in a whisper : 


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WITHOUT SIN 


“ God has given and God has taken away. Your little 
child is in heaven !” In one nionieiit all the pent-up reserve 
of the Mother and all the faith of the virgin were gone. 
She remembered nothing. She was only a woman and she 
was frightened, and out of the fulness of her heart she cried 
aloud : 

“Father! Father! why hast thou forsaken me?” 

Twice the hysteria of her frantic grief nearly broke from 
her, and twice she beat it back to her breaking heart. 

Then the mercy of tears was vouchsafed to her, and with 
wet cheeks and blinded eyes she groped her way to her dead 
child. 

“Ah! my baby! My little darling son,” she sobbed, and 
in a very ecstasy of womanly grief, dropped on her knees 
beside the crib. 


CHAPTER XXXII 


Mary was not conscious of the precise moment when the 
acute poignancy of her grief was allayed by the healing 
balm of Confidence, or when the pale, self-sown fiowers of 
ilope first blossomed on the storm -swept waste of her 
bruised heart. 

She was alone at the time, and with the relief of a calm 
there evolved the vague remembrance that people had come 
and gone in the nursery. There had been soft footsteps 
and quiet whisperings, and she remembered vaguely that 
the child’s nurse had come in and been led away again cry- 
ing noisily. 

Now the room was tidy and fresh, the curtains were 
looped into precise folds, and the blinds three parts lowered, 
but above the window sills the pale rays of the November 
sun filtered on to the floor. A sweet fragrance of lilies 
floated from a vase, which loving hands had set upon the 
table. 

Only the cot had not been touched. No one had dared, 
as yet, to disturb the sacred sorrow of the bereaved mother. 

She raised her face from where for hours it had laid 
buried in the pillows close to the wax-white, baby form. 
The tempest which had swept over her had been too fierce 
in its passage not to leave traces for all time, but the look 
of terror had gone from her eyes, and the rictus of agony 
from her mouth. Only the ineffable sadness which lives in 
the face of the Mother of Sorrows was painted there instead, 
but the resignation of the Madonna, which is the glory of 


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all wonianliood, was wanting. For in the sunken depths of 
her weary, tear-washed eyes, flickered and grew and 
strengthened to a great flame moment by moment the fire 
of an unquenchable Faith, which only shone the brighter for 
the healing gush of quiet weeping which broke from her 
when her gaze first fell upon the still face of her little child. 

Her gentle weeping finished, she rose to her feet, and 
with an almost feverish haste fetched fresh linen, perfumed 
with violets and edged with fine soft lace. She spread it 
on the bed, then gowned the tiny clay-cold body in a fresh 
night-dress of snowy lawn. But swiftly as she worked, 
every action was touched with that same humble reverence 
which had been the enforced measure of all her past inter- 
course between the child and herself. 

As she straightened the little limbs and smoothed the 
tangled curls, an intense peace quivered about her drooping 
mouth. As she moved about the room, her sorrow seemed 
to fall from her like a garment, and she looked as though 
preparing for a/e^e instead of for a funeral. 

When all was complete, she took one lily, tall, spotless 
and sweet, and laid it, a fitting emblem, beside the dead 
child. Flower-face kissed flower-face on the pillow, and 
neither was more fair nor stainless than the other. 

Her task done, she turned aside and bathed her own 
face and hands in fresh water, bound the disordered coils 
of her heavy hair about her head and re-arranged her gown. 
When she deemed herself fit, she knelt at the foot of the 
little bed, though not too intimately near, and adored — as 
poor sinners worship at saints’ shrines. 

So Lady St. Cyprien and Lady Theo Bellastier found 
her, wrapped in a mantle of divinest Faith and lifted by 
Hope above all earthly grief, when, in response to a message 
from Marrable, they came to weep with her for the death 
of her son. 


WITHOUT SIN 279 

It was with uplifted finger and a sad, reproachful smile 
Mary moved to greet them, 

“ Dearest Lady St. Cyprien, how kind to come ; but I do 
not want you to grieve for me, or for the little one. He 
must be so happy — and I — I can rejoice with him. Oh, do 
not cry. I entreat you not to cry. I did at first ; for hours 
my belief in the Father’s goodness was weakened, and I 
mourned as mothers mourn. But now 

A great wave of rapture swept over her white face, and 
her lips moved silently as though a transport of unspeak- 
able joy thrilled her. 

To the two sorrowing women who had come, sad and 
heavy-hearted, to offer what the}^ could of consolation, her 
words conveyed nothing, while her very self-control seemed 
an expression of despair. 

Lady St. Cyprien, her delicate face quivering with an 
emotion which, for the girl’s sake, she endeavoured to con- 
ceal, clasped Mary in her arms, and rocked her there as one 
would rock a sorrowful child. The soothing voice, the 
sweet womanly clasp, touched the vein of self-pity which is 
in us all, and for a time the two wept softly in a luxury of 
grief together. 

But through her tears and the tears of her dear friend, 
her strained senses awoke to the consciousness of another 
sound. It rose from her bedside and had the drone of 
mumbled prayers. 

Mary raised her head from above Lady St. Cyprien’ s 
heart and, turning, saw Lady Theo kneeling by the crib 
swaying her black-gowned body to and fro. Her small un- 
gloved hands fingered restlesslj^ at a big rosary, her eyes 
were turned upwards in her head, her lips muttered a jar- 
gon of Catholic and Protestant supplications. She was fast 
working herself into a state of religious frenzy, when Mary’s 
voice, hard and tense, struck across her devotions. 


280 


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‘‘ What are you doing there?” 

^‘Praying, dearest Mary, for the dead!” 

“For the dead! There is no dead here!” 

Lady Theo dropped her rosary with a clatter, and Lady 
St. Cyprien stretched out supplicating hands to the girl, 
who, with flashing eyes and quivering body, stood by the 
bedside. 

“Mary, my poor, darling child!” she cried, plucking at 
Mary’s gown. 

But Mary, with deaf ears and eyes that saw nothing, let 
the stemmed passion of Belief creep through heart and 
brain, body and soul. 

“Dead! You think the child is dead?” she cried aloud. 
“ How dare you so mock at God — and at me?” 

She stooped over Lady Theo, who crouched half fright- 
ened on her knees, and, taking her by the shoulder, dragged 
her to her feet and thrust her back from the bed. 

“ Where is your boasted trust? Where is your vaunted 
faith? You who for so long have professed belief in the 
great miracle that has been, and the grand mercy of for- 
giveness and redemption that is to be ; you who have prayed 
to be among those who shall in the course of years hear and 
learn the divine truth; you who have been witness to the 
manifestation of which I have been the poor medium ; are 
you so little worthy to be tried, so blind, so stubborn, that 
you cannot — will not — see?” 

Lady Theo, her eyes wide with terror, clung to Lady St. 
Cyprien, whose pale face was bathed in tears of pity and 
grief. 

But Mary, straight and tall, with her arms, from which 
the full silken sleeves had rustled to the shoulder, raised 
above her head, stood like a prophetess of old. The fire of 
the future burnt in her half-closed eyes, and from her 
mouth, which scarcely moved, she spoke in trumpet tones. 


WITHOUT SIN 


281 


“ Do you not know, 0 you of coward belief and weakest 
confidence, that the child is not dead? lie was not born 
into the world to die, but to live — live for ever! Do you 
not understand that it is my faith and the faith of those 
who are strong enough to believe with me that is being 
tried? God has sent this great temptation to strengthen 
and confirm, not to kill, our poor mortal hopes. Have not 
the prophets said that he who should be born of a pure 
virgin shall never die, but shall live — to redeem his people?” 

Her voice rose higher, and she shook like one in whom 
an inward spirit stirs. 

“ The ordeal of my soul, the proof of the prophecy, lies 
here before me and before you, who have been chosen as 
witnesses of the truth. My son is not dead, for the attri- 
bute of immortality is his. He is for a brief space in 
heaven, but he shall come again — on the Third Day!” 


CHAPTER XXXIII 


Tee morning of the third day crept like a grey ghost 
through the land. Its pale presence woke the country side 
to a dreary life. In London, where for twenty-four hours 
a sweeping rain had fallen, it struck wan reflections from 
the watery roads and dripping roofs. 

One by one the sightless eyes of the houses were opened 
to the day, but at Holmhurst the blinds remained lowered, 
and a dim artificial light filled all the rooms. Only in the 
nursery it was gay and bright. There were no sounds of 
mourning, there were no signs of grief. A dozen tall 
candles, set in chased silver, shed a fair light over the 
flowers, which stood everywhere in gay vases, and about 
the toys which were scattered on all sides, as though the 
still little figure on the snowy bed had just turned from his 
childish games to sleep, and would soon awake to play 
again. 

But the brilliant flowers bloomed and the wax candles 
sparkled as though they mocked by their life and brilliancy 
the dead quietude of the room. Eor he on the bed slept in 
silence, and she who watched was as still. 

The heavy rumble of a passing cart labouring over the 
sodden road roused her from the conscious coma which in 
the morning hours creeps over those who have kept a vigil 
all the night. She rose from her chair, and, walking to the 
window, raised the blind. 

“The day has come!” she murmured, and, opening the 
window, leaned out to greet the morning. 


WITHOUT SIN 


283 


She was much changed. The cruel, hard light showed 
that the gleam of red gold had faded from her hair, and 
that the pulses of young blood had stagnated in her cheek. 
Her eyes, sunken deep and bistre-circled, were washed 
quite colourless by weeping and by watching. Her little 
nose, so fine and delicate, stood sharply out from her drawn, 
livid face. Her mouth, with the bow-like curves and cherry 
ripeness which have been the despair and delight of all 
painters since the beginning of art, was white and dry and 
set in a straight line. 

It was the face of a woman who had suffered to the full, 
and yet it was the face of a woman who hoped. For as she 
turned her worn features to the sulky skies she said, The 
day has come, and he will come too!” 

Leaving the window, she turned to the bed, and gazed 
one moment on the tiny form which three days back she 
had with reverential fingers veiled beneath a great square 
of fine lace. She did not raise the covering, for in her sight 
it seemed a desecration that merely mortal hands should 
touch that which was immortal. 

She was content to stand with bowed head and mute 
mouth at the bedside, and savour the sweet, faint scent of 
the lily which still lay upon the pillow beside the veiled face. 

After a little she sat again in the wide, deep chair, and 
as she leant back among the pillows sleep fell upon her. 

And as she slept a dream came to her. 

She dreamed she was standing in the centre of a great 
waste, and that nothing was above her but the inverted 
hollow of the Heavens, which, cup-like, touched the edges 
of the world. She stood, a lonely figure in the vast empti- 
ness, and her senses seemed as void and purposeless as the 
surroundings of her dream. 

Cycles rolled by, and Time expired in the arms of 
Eternity, while she stood — and waited. 


284 


WITHOUT SIN 


Then the dead air quivered and stirred and dimpled into 
Life, as a stagnant pool is troubled by the passing whirr of 
a bird’s wings. What was first a flutter grew to a sigh, 
and then to a distant groan. And to the accompanying 
trample of myriads of feet, and the roar of generations of 
tongues, the Wanderers of the World, the chosen People of 
God, the outcast races of men, trooped over the edges of 
the great plain, and flowed like a mighty flood towards that 
lonely woman. 

They came around her and lapped her very feet as the 
waves of the rising tide lap the rocks. They lifted their 
faces, old and young, rich and poor, fair and dark, yet all 
alike stained with Sin and Death, to her benign counte- 
nance, and every face was hungry for Kedemption, and 
every eye yearned for the Promised Land. They called 
aloud in the Tongues o^ all Time and of all Nations, but to 
her who dreamed each one cried the same : 

“Oh! Blessed among Women! Chosen of God! where 
is that Mighty One, the offspring of thy pure body, who 
shall come and lead us from among strange people, and 
lands that we know not, back to our own country, to that 
fair city — the New Jerusalem, where we would be?” 

And they fell like mown corn about her, beating their 
breasts in supplication, and wailing: 

“Oh! Mary! Mary! where is thy Son?” 

And she dreamed that she raised her eyes, weary with 
the restless rocking of the human sea, and gazed into the 
vast heart of Heaven. 

The skies above her melted into effulgent mists of azure 
and rose and gold, and parted like shattered cobwebs on a 
morning breeze. And down, down, down, floated a wide 
circle of choiring Angels, which wreathed and twined, 
expanded and clustered close again about a majestic Figure, 
which was clothed in white and crowned with flaming gold, 


WITHOUT SIN 


285 


and carried a stainless lily — the emblem of Purity — in his 
outstretched hand. 

Behind the Figure rolled away among the gauzy mists a 
very fair country, cut with great rivers and set with white 
cities and gleaming palaces. 

“Behold!” said a mighty Voice, which shook the opened 
Heavens from end to end. “ Behold ! my People, you called 
for the Son of Mary, and 1 am here!” 

And Mary looked in the face of the Figure, and it was 
the face of her Son, only grander, nobler, fairer than she 
had ever seen it. 

The People looked up too and cried out : 

“Our Kedeemer is come! Blessed is He, and blessed is 
the Woman who bore him!” 

Then she dreamed that they brought a great throne of 
gold and set her upon it, and it was so high that she too was 
exalted to the Heavens, and the People — that grand race 
which had been since the world began, and which she had so 
suffered to save — worshipped her Son and herself together. 

And the adoration went on and on through the endless 
cycles of Eternity until that too died, and the paeans were 
all ended. Then with an awful roar the Heavens rolled 
together in the blackness of night everlasting, and with a 
mighty crash the golden throne of her glory and exaltation 
crumbled into nothingness, and she was hurled into the 
bottomless abyss of space amid the mocking cries of a 
million devil voices. 

Then came oblivion, and she slept the death-like sleep of 
intense exhaustion. 

The hours stole by in soft-footed silence. Outside, a 
curtain of grey drizzle hid heaven’s face and cast a dreary 
shadow on the world. At half-past three it was almost 
dark, even in the nursery where the drawn-up blinds let 
in the last rays of the day, 


286 


WITHOUT SIN 


Once the maid stole in. She was a faithful creature who 
loved her mistress, and she was pleased that the sleepless 
vigil of five days and nights was ended and that Mary 
slept at last. 

With quiet thoughtfulness set set fresh candles in the 
silver sconces, and wherever a flower drooped removed it 
before she left the room. 

It was late when Mary woke with a violent start. The 
windows were black dark and the newly lit candles winked 
at her through the gloom. With a low cry she leaped to 
her feet laying her hands over her heart, which was flut- 
tering like a frightened bird in her bosom. 

How long had she slept — how much had she dreamed? 
Had the dawning of the third day been real, or was it yet 
to come? 

She turned her eyes towards the bed. There all was 
still, and she sighed with relief. The grey chill dawn, the 
glorious redemption had alike been dreams. The miracle 
still remained to be performed. 

Just then it seemed to her as though she dreamed again, 
for the swing of mufded footsteps, the hum of whispering 
voices rippled to her ears, and, as in her dream, grew 
louder and came nearer. 

The inability of her tired brain to distinguish between 
the real and the unreal impelled her towards the door, 
which was ajar. With her hand upon the heavy curtain 
and her face thrust forward into the bright corridor she 
listened, striving with all her senses to hear more clearly 
and to understand. 

Drawn by desire, she slipped out of the room, and, cross- 
ing the corridor, leaned over the gallery and looked into 
the big hall below. At first her eyes, still filled with sleep 
and the subdued light of the nursery, saw nothing, for the 
big electric chandelier blazed between the floor and herself. 


WITHOUT SIN 


287 


Then by degrees the details of the scene were unfolded, and 
the dark inchoate masses scattered on the marble pavement 
took form and shape. 

In the doorway of the drawing-room stood Lady St. 
Cyprien, with Dr. Marrable, Mr. Erastns Bawdon and 
Martin Baird, whose white head was bowed upon his 
breast. Away to the left Avere all the women servants, 
their white caps and aprons painfully sharp in the strong 
light. In the centre stood a group of men, all in deep 
black. They were bareheaded; their greasy hats dotted 
the console tables. One of them carried something under 
his arm which shone and twinkled like silver as the light 
caught it here and there. As Mary looked with eyes that 
widened in her blanched face, the voices and the shuffling 
steps became accordant, and, as in her dream, the river of 
humanity rose up and flowed towards her. 

Up the wide staircase it rolled quietly, stealthily, but 
oh ! so surely. For its tide was set upwards and towards 
her child. 

Yet there was more of anger than of fear in her heart, 
as she ran back to the nursery and stood before the bed. 

“Who are you? What have you come for?” she said in 
a loAV voice, laying her hand on the edge of the frilled pil- 
low, and firmly facing the little crowd, which surged 
through the doorway and seemed to All the room. 

For a moment no one answered. The hired servants of 
death were there merely to perform their duty, not to ex- 
plain their presence. The others, her friends, those who 
knew the dear faiths and the fond beliefs which were 
rooted in the very foundations of her being, hesitated 
among themselves as to who should strike the blow which 
was to shatter the fabric of her life. 

“Tell her, Noel,” whispered Lady St. Cyprien, among 
her sobs. “ It will be less hard for you.” 


288 


WITHOUT SIN 


A faint smile of bitterest irony crossed his face, which 
appeared very grey in the candlelight. But he made no 
demur, nor did he falter, as he strode to Mary’s side and 
said: 

‘‘They have come for the child. It is time.” 

“Come for the child? Time?” she repeated, in a vacant 
manner, and staring in his face, where something in his 
sympathetic eyes seemed to rouse a faint fear in her own. 
Then, with a courage born of a sickening despair, she 
passed one hand across her damp forehead, and cried, in 
louder tones: “Time! Yes! it is time! Time for the 
great God to show His unbelieving people that He still 
loves them — and will forgive. It is time for the saviour 
of the world to manifest the truth, and to justify his 
mother. Behold ! The golden throne is set for my son and 
for me. You who are here shall see the miracle! Believe 
— and adore!” 

She turned, and before Marrable could catch her white 
hands, she had torn the merciful veil from the bed. 

The cry of gladness with which she stooped over the 
pillows changed to a moan of horror as she gazed, for the 
fingers of corruption had already marked the little one for 
its own, and the fading lily was fairer to see than the dead 
child. 

Marrable dared not look down at the bed; his eyes were 
fixed on Mary, who could only stare and stare at the poor 
morsel of humanity, as though she saw it not, or seeing, 
did not understand. 

The rich lace dropped from her fingers, and she stepped 
back from the bedside. With the far-away look of her 
girlhood’s days growing in her face, she stood, rigid and 
voiceless as a stone, while her baby was hidden away for 
ever. 

No word nor gesture came from her even when all was 


WITHOUT SIN 


289 


over, and, amid the sobs of the women, the men shouldered 
their light burden, and the procession filed from the room. 

Only Marrable remained with her, for he could not go. 
All the reserve of a lifetime was broken down; the im- 
passive mask of his face, scored by deep lines of study and 
self-control, was torn and convulsed by a thousand agonies; 
the suppliant hands he stretched out across the little empty 
bed trembled with the tearing tide of emotion. 

“ Mary !” he cried, and the long-stemmed passion of love, 
the yearning to comfort, made his voice hoarse and sharper. 

It should have told her all, but it struck deaf ears, and 
a dead heart. 

“Mary!” he cried again and essayed to touch but one 
fold of her gown. 

“Leave me.” 

The music of her voice had gone. She spoke dully, as 
one who talks in sleep, and wrestles with the horror of 
some awful dream. For the last time he looked upon her 
face, then turned and left her. 

She stood alone — in the centre of the room where the 
glory of her maidenhood had passed three happy years of 
life — in the room whence the shame of her womanhood had 
just been carried in all the corruption of death. 

Amid infinite agony, the scales of innocence and igno- 
rance were falling from her eyes, the veil of purity was 
being torn from her soul. The cruel light of a never-dying 
day of dishonour was breaking slowly but ruthlessly in 
upon her ; for the child who liad come to her out of immor- 
tality was mortal, and, oh, God! the Son of man! 

He who had been her crown of honour among all women 
was but the brand of her shame. The boast of her imma- 
culate virginity had been the defilement of her sex. 

Her child, born to redeem, and to immortality, had been 
conceived in shame, had died in sin! 

19 


290 


WITHOUT SIN 


Transfixed with physical horror, and self-loathing, Mary 
raised her hands to her face, as though she could have rent 
the beauty which had been her own undoing. 

“ What man — what devil — dragged me to this hideous 
shame, and made my darling my disgrace?” she cried, to 
the empty air. 

Then the outraged virgin was lost in the broken-hearted 
mother, and as she recalled the repressed love, the rever- 
ence which had stayed every caress, the awe which had 
killed every kiss, the floodgates of her starved maternity 
were opened, and the storm swept over her soul. 

Her shattered faith, her stained purity, were forgotten in 
one overwhelming remembrance. Her little child, her 
darling baby was dead — and taken from her — and she had 
been cheated of that last kiss of an eternal farewell. 

A great agony caught her by the throat and at the heart. 
She slipped her clenched hands from her distorted face to 
her breast. The pain tore at her like a wolf. 

Then God had mercy on her, and she crashed uncon- 
scious to the floor. 


CHAPTER XXXIV 


The green-tipped branches of the elms on either side of 
the lane leaned together as though supporting the blue 
canopy of heaven above the slowly moving figures of Lady 
St. Cyprien and Noel Marrable. The sunlight filtering- 
through the foliage made bright pool of shimmering gold 
on the roadway and the wide grass borders alike. Save 
for those two, and for some rooks which wheeled and cawed 
above the swinging tree-tops, the whole countryside war 
devoid of life as a desert. 

The first signs of habitation came from a neatly trimmed 
growth of laurels which grew under the shelter of a red-brick 
wall as far as a cupola above a low porch, up which the 
3/oung ivy was running like a lizard. 

“Will you call for mein about two hours?” said Lady 
St. Cyprien, pausing as she reached this door. 

Marrable bowed gravely in assent, and then turned slowly 
away down the shady road the two had just traversed. 

The Countess sighed a little as she watched him go, and 
noted the slow precision of his heavy footsteps and the too 
obvious stoop of his square-built shoulders. 

“How cruel the past three years have been to him,” she 
murmured to herself. “ Who would have thought he would 
have felt so keenly?” 

“The Reverend Mother will see your ladyship in the 
garden. Will you come this way?” 

The narrow oak door beneath the cupola was open, and 
an elderly woman, whose plain face was rendered attractive 


292 


WITHOUT SIN 


by the white coif and ample grey veil of a nun’s habit, 
stood just within, and invited entrance to the convent 
precincts. 

With softly pattering steps, the porteress led the way 
across a small flagged court, then opening a gate set in an 
inner wall of warm, red brick, ushered the Countess into 
a great garden, which seemed to nestle about the sides of a 
rambling house. 

‘‘ The Eeverend Mother will come to you here, ” said the 
nun, as she closed the f/rUle behind her, and trotted away 
across the paved yard. 

Left for a moment alone. Lady St. Cyprien looked curi- 
ously round the haven of refuge for broken hearts that 
Erastus Bawdon’s dilettante fancy had founded as a safe 
shelter for such poor tempest-tossed doves as feared, after 
one storm, to encounter again even the most favourable of 
the world’s winds. All was very peaceful and still. The 
thick green yew hedges that lined the paths gave to the 
garden a very cool and shadowy effect. Up in the blue 
sky great round white clouds ran races, but nothing harsher 
than the drowsy twitter of a bird, lazily dozing through 
the hot summer afternoon, broke the scented silence of the 
enclosure. 

Heavy-headed carnations and roses of cream and red, 
purple velvet pansies and lilies of argentine whiteness, 
seemed to be queens of this quite realm, so proudly did 
they flaunt their beauties before the sun and radiant sky. 
Among them, singly or in pairs, came and went the nuns, 
who read in silence or mumbled over their beads, or even 
when they talked spoke as do those who fear to wake a 
sleeping child. 

Grey-gowned and with their long gauze veils floating 
about them, they seemed to glide like indefinite shadows 
over the wide, shaven lawns or among the dusky bosciuetSy 


WITHOUT SIN 


293 


as might the pale ghosts in the Garden of Proserpine. As 
Lady St. Cyprien looked upon their faces, all levelled to a 
certain similitude of innocence and beatitude by the encir- 
cling bands of stiffened white linen, she wondered vaguely 
if they had even lived at all. 

The waiting moments lengthened, and Lady St. Cyprien 
was fast becoming saturated with the subtle mystery of the 
place, when the light laugh of a young girl rang through 
the air. It almost jarred, it was so intensely full of the 
joy of life. It brought movement, brisk and quick, with 
it, for at the far end of a broad terraced walk, along which 
quaintly cut figures of clipped box kept grim sentinelship, 
appeared a group of girls wearing white dresses and with 
unbound locks curling about their slim, unformed figures. 
They were talking eagerly, and were clustered like wind- 
tossed white flowers about a tall figure, robed in vague dove- 
grey, who walked among them. 

Tears sprang hotly into Lady St. Cyprien^s eyes, and 
blurred the face of the advancing Mother Superior. But 
the loving heart and faithful memory recognised through the 
new habit the peculiarly gliding walk, the meekly gracious 
carriage of the head, and the slender beauty of the limbs, 
that neither veil nor coarse serge could wholly conceal. 

At the end of the terrace the Reverend Mother dismissed 
the children about her, and with slightly hastened steps 
came towards the Countess, whose outstretched hands and 
quivering mouth gave a voiceless welcome even before the 
two weeping women clasped one another and sobbed out 
their joy at meeting and their sorrow for the past, which 
was buried in a grave that was nameless, yet would be for 
ever green. 

The nun was the first to dry her tears, and, with the long 
delicate hands Lady St. Cyprien remembered so well, she 
drew the elder woman back to a seat. 


294 


WITHOUT SIN 


“Dear friend, it is so good, so like yourself, to jour- 
ney here to see me,” she said presently, as both grew 
calmer. 

“ Dearest child, my one wish all the time I was abroad 
was to meet you again ; my one effort since I arrived home 
has been to come here.” 

“I heard you were so ill two years ago in Rome. You 
are still weak?” The Mother Superior's slender fingers 
rested for a moment on the stout cane which Lady St. 
Cyprien held in one hand. 

“ My doctors say so,” she said, with a faint smile. “ But 
for once I know better; it is age — advancing age. I am 
quite an old woman now.” 

She heaved the little sigh of regret with which woman 
yields tribute to the past, but a moment later said, more 
cheerfully, “And you! How is time dealing with you? 
Let me see!” 

With the same simplicity and lack of self-conscious em- 
barrassment that years ago had made Mary Levinge, the 
child, display her beauty to her grandfather’s aristocratic 
patrons in the Art Gallery, Mary Levinge, the woman, 
offered her face now to her friend’s scrutiny. In outline it 
seemed unaltered, and the habitual gravity of expression 
had defied the passage of sorrow and years. Only the fair, 
clear skin had taken on a waxen whiteness, and the in- 
scrutable eyes sometimes looked as though they had seen 
into the great “ Beyond.” 

“You look as beautiful as ever,” said Lady St. Cyprien, 
after long gazing. “ And — you seem to have found peace 
and happiness.” 

For one brief moment a silence fell. The fluttered 
leaves, the birds, the very air forbore to stir. A great 
wave of emotion passed over Mary Levinge’s face, and the 
piteous droop, the sweetly weak quiver of coming tears 


WITHOUT SIN 


295 


touched her lips as of old. Then she smiled bravely, and, 
lifting her clear, unclouded eyes, she said composedly : 

“ Yes ! I have found peace. This is my little Peace Pool, 
and perfect quiet and faith dwell here with me. But you 
are happy, too, I hope. Here, though we are not in the 
world we are of it, and news of dear friends comes to us 
sometimes — through our pupils. And so I have heard 
that Lord Stansdale has married and given you a boy to 
take the place of the little girl you were once a mother to.’" 

“ I am glad that you, too, have children a*bout you, Mary 
— Reverend Mother!” said the Countess. 

Mary smiled at the mistake, and the precision of the 
correction, and said softly : 

“ Yes ! to have children about one is a great blessing — 
sometimes.” 

The last word slipped from her involuntarily; and as 
though wishing to avoid past memories, she rose hastily 
and said : 

“ But will you not come and see the convent, and the 
children’s quarters?” 

Side by side the two women crossed the velvet lawn and 
passed through a glass door into the convent parlour, and 
then to the wide corridor, from which opened the school- 
rooms and refectories. 

“ If it were wet, these great silent rooms would ring with 
the children’s voices, but this summer has been so fine, they 
even have their classes in the lower garden.” 

As Mary led Lady St. Cyprien through the white-panelled 
convent rooms and described the purpose of each, so did 
she tell of the daily history of her quiet life. Here did 
she pass the morning hours in meditation, there did she 
speak out of her faith to those who wavered and doubted. 

This room she loved ; for of an evening she read here to 
the children. Then she led the way up the low stairs to 


296 


WITHOUT SIN 


where, in snow-white dormitories, the young girls slept at 
night beneath the calm eyes of pictured saints. 

‘‘ They look so pretty when they are asleep, ” she said, in 
a voice that shook a little. “ But they lie so peacefully, 
that I am afraid sometimes they may be dead, and I come 
back each night again to assure myself that all is well 
before going to the chapel.” 

From long corridors Lady St. Cyprien caught glimpses 
of the narrow cells where the sisters themselves snatched 
rest between the nightly services. Mary’s own room was 
but little larger and very simply furnished. Yet Lady St. 
Cyprien noted how happy she seemed in the possession of 
the poor little place, and how she gloried in the peep of 
flower and sky and tree she had from the narrow window. 

A door cut in the wall, led on a small staircase which 
Mary said led to the chapel. “ You will come with me 
there, won’t you?” she asked, with something of her old 
pleading way. ^‘It is very beautiful,” she said. ‘‘All that 
I ever learnt from my grandfather and from Martin Baird 
I have remembered and utilised for it.” 

Small though the convent chapel was, it was a very 
treasure-house of art. One small side altar was especially 
fair with rare lace and white flowers, and set among the 
tapers and the blossoms was the little picture of the 
Madonna which Lady St. Cyprien had first seen hanging 
in the Bond Street shop. 

“ Still faithful to that picture?” she queried, as Mary 
rose from where, she had knelt in silent prayer on first 
entering the chapel. 

“Yes! I could not part with it,” answeredMary gravely. 
“For it brought me my joy and my sorrow — and my 
religion.” 

A bell rang out a clear note on the afternoon air, and 
throbbed harmoniously through the chapel, into which the 


WITHOUT SIN 


297 


setting snn was pouring rich rays through the stained glass 
windows. 

‘‘ It is the hour for Benediction,” said Mary in a whisper, 
as one by one the grey-veiled Sisters glided into the chapel, 
and, after genuflecting to the radiant high altar, slipped 
into their places. Will you wait for me a little while? 
Sister Angela shall show you the way.” 

Lady St. Cyprien followed a silent figure which, after 
leaving her at the door of the visitors’ waiting-room, re- 
turned hastily towards the chapel. 

Outlined against the window stood Noel Marrable. 

‘‘Are the two hours already gone?” cried Lady St. Cyp- 
rien. “How quickly the time has passed.” 

“Have you seen her! Is she well?” asked Marrable 
abruptly. 

“ Quite well, and more beautiful than she used to be, I 
think! and she is happy too— that is a great thing.” 

“ Has she forgotten, do you think?” 

Lady St. Cyprien shook her head sadly. 

“Noel, women never forget such things. No scars of 
such tragedies may mar a face, but the hearts of women 
who have suffered in sprit and in body as she has done 
must carry the marks of the wounds for all time.” 

Marrable said nothing, but presently raising his eyes, 
caught sight of the picture of the Annunciation that Eliot 
Mayne had once painted of Mary as the Holy Maiden. 

“Why is that here?” he cried sharply, nodding towards 
where the picture hung above the mantelshelf. “ I thought 
it was painted for the little church here.” 

“ Mary told me this afternoon that she had it moved from 
there when she came. She says she has taken a dislike to 
the picture.” 

A burst of music from the open chapel window floated 
across the garden, now more peaceful than ever, in the rays 


298 


WITHOUT SIN 


of the slowly declining sun. The nuns were singing the 
Litany of the Blessed Virgin. 

“ It is scarcely surprising that the associations of it are 
painful,” she went on, her low voice scarcely rising above 
the distant chant. The painting of it was connected with 
misfortune from the beginning, when she had that bad 
fainting ht at the studio.” 

“ What was that?” said Marrable. 

“Did you never know she fainted there once? She told 
me of it afterwards.” 

Marrable faced sharply round and stared at Lady St. 
Cyprien. 

“Told you of it afterwards? What do you mean?” he 
cried roughly. “Were you not there at the time?” 

“No! I don’t understand ” 

“And / don’t understand. I always thought that you 
accompanied Miss Levinge to May lie’s house.” 

“ That was why it was so unfortunate. I had not been 
able to go that day, and she went alone.” 

“Alone!” cried Marrable, in a terrible voice. “Alone 
and fainting. Poor child! Poor helpless child.” 

The distant music flowed like a river of peace through 
the convent garden, and roused the birds to join in the flnal 
chorale. It swept in grand waves through the open win- 
dows, and echoed against the white wood walls. It 
drowned in the majesty of a grand Amen the few words 
that Lady St. Cyprien forced from her lips. “Noel! Noel! 
What do you mean? What do you think ?” 

“ Only what I have always thought that she was inno- 
cent. ” 

He raised his bowed head and looked at the Countess 
with miserable eyes. 

“ And you think ” 

“ I am snre ! But does she not wonder — or suspect?” 


WITHOUT SIN 


299 


Lady St. Cyprien shook her head. 

“ I am certain that she does not, for to-day she has spoken 
quite simply and trustfully of the mystery that God in His 
own good time will explain.” 

“Then she must never know. Hush! she is here!” 

With. the odours of incense and of flowers clinging about 
her serge robe, and the fervour of ardent worship still in 
her grey eyes, Mary came quietly from the lawn through 
the French windows into the room, and Noel Marrable, 
afraid of his own emotions, with bowed head left the two 
women alone to their farewells. 

It was only when Lady St. Cyprien joined him in the 
shadows of the porch, that he saw Mary again, standing 
with her pale, sweet face framed in the white coif, and the 
vague folds of the grey gauze veil. 

She smiled once very sadly and said : 

“ Farewell, dear friends, farewell. Pray for me, as I do 
for you.” 

He fell upon his knees reverently, and kissed her white 
hand; then as he rose, the heavy oak door swung to, and 
Mary was no more seen. 












J-Wl 


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Without Sin 


A Novel 


By 

Martin |. Pritchard 


New York 

William Heinemann 

1896 


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